by Laura Munson | Oct 2, 2023 | Motherhood
Sometimes we have to look in the rearview mirror for insights into how to move forward in our lives. The time of Covid lockdown, sick with the virus, on top of a job/income on pause, and a cancelled book tour for a novel that took eight years to write……isn’t an alluring place to look. But often, that which we resist, is the very thing we need to revisit. I haven’t wanted to re-read this essay in three years. Today, however, I woke up to the smell of toast, and with an exceptional gratitude that I couldn’t quite place. I lived alone, in a sad empty nest, for a long time, and I am a loyal pack creature. The truth is: I’m now in a deeply loving, and highly surprising relationship that just keeps getting richer by the day/month/year, and my nest is no longer empty. This morning I knew it was time to glean the lessons from that particular, and also surprisingly peopled time…to truly find gratitude for this one. I hope that it will help you do the same, wherever you’ve been afraid to look. I know that it’s not healthy to live in the past. But it’s a very good teacher. Please enjoy this essay:
April, 2020
I wake up to the smell of someone in the kitchen. Maybe it’s coffee. Maybe it’s toast. I don’t open my eyes and I don’t know why. I only know that I don’t want to know why. That this smell is a good thing and that there are bad things. Really bad things. And if I keep my eyes closed, I won’t remember what they are.
I also know that this is a new ability I have: my mind on full stop, in my waking moments. And it’s not something I’ve learned from somebody in a hallowed hall, or holy place. Or from somebody whose words are in the stack of dusty books on my bedside table, getting dustier. Or somebody whose TED Talk I watched on my computer that is under my bed, ready to feed me today’s news, and remind me of my overdue bills, and deliver me my mother’s concern for my health and for her own, and all of the things that I’m not thinking about. Yet. Because they hurt. And I don’t want to remember why.
The not wanting to remember cracks the full stop spell. And I remember then why I don’t want to open my eyes. I’m not very good at this selective thinking. It’s only been a month.
But someone’s in the kitchen. I decide to think about only this, just for a few more waking moments.
This is not a game. This is how it has to be. Every morning. If I’m going to be safe, and well, and hopeful, and look for silver linings, and attempt what everyone is telling everyone to be and do right now. Including me. In this daily morning moment in this “difficult time of uncertainty and new normal,” still closer to dreams than consciousness or euphemism, I try for at least some of it.
So I keep my eyes shut, pressing lid to lid because they want to open, and my hand wants to grab my phone and my computer and a wise dusty book all at the same time, and my brain wants to careen through the newly-not-normal details of my life.
Instead, I implore myself to smell. Because I realize in this moment…I can smell. And I remember: I haven’t been able to for a while. And there’s someone in the kitchen making beautiful smells that have wafted up the stairs and under my door and into my bed with me. My bed, my new home office, my new mostly home.
I widen my nostrils and anchor my tongue on the ridge behind my teeth. Open the back of my throat. Let my lungs expand. My lungs are clear for the first time in weeks. But I don’t think about that. I think about this new gift that is in the back of my nose, and now in my sinuses that spread my cheeks into a smile that’s not really a smile. Or maybe it is. Sort of. I don’t want to think about smiling like I don’t want to read books or watch TED Talks or learn from holy people.
Toast.
Yes, definitely toast. Sourdough toast. From the bread we made.
We.
I hold the scent and allow the characters to ride in on it. It feels safe to let myself imagine these characters. It could be either of them: my daughter. Twenty-three. Home from her young adult life in San Francisco, still with a job. My son, nineteen, home from his sophomore year in college and a lost baseball season. I’m not thinking about why. Only that they’re home and one of them, or both, is making toast. I let myself think about that, full stop.
Toast.
That I can smell.
From bread we made.
From wild yeast starter that our neighbor left in our mailbox in a Mason jar.
I almost think about why it wasn’t a nice long over-due visit with tea.
I almost think about why no one in this house is going to the grocery store or anywhere else for that matter.
I almost think about how we wiped down the Mason jar with sanitizer before we brought it in the house.
But I stop the thought.
Toast.
I touch my face with my eyes still closed. I don’t think about why I’m not supposed to touch my face. I’m still smiling. That makes me smile more. With the scent of someone in the kitchen.
Someone-in-the-kitchen relaxes my eyes and helps me to think another calm thought. My daily motherhood is back. I let myself think about a month ago, when the hardest thing I was facing was a debilitating and shameful, and thusly clandestine, haunt that is commonly known as Empty Nest. An unpopular and unsympathetic malady. We choose to have kids and it’s normal for them to fledge. We want them to fledge. Right? So why all the crying and loneliness and abject disorientation?
In short, I was pretending I was fine. I wasn’t.
I was alone for the first time in my life in a farmhouse in Montana. I was holding the banister on the stairs— no one will find me for weeks if I take a fall. I was thinking that way. The grey on grey of winter didn’t help. The truth is: I was hardly eating. I was hardly leaving my bed. I was waking with my eyes wide open at all hours of the night and early morning and I was having a hard time closing them at all.
And then this thing that I’m trying not to think about happened. And I’ve chosen to stay in this room, in this bed, when all I want to do is not be in this room, in this bed. Be with my children who are across the hall. Take care of them. But it’s hard to walk down the stairs, banister and all. I haven’t had energy. And this cough…
I let myself scan the last weeks. I haven’t gotten one of the few Montana tests because I haven’t had a fever and though I have had some of the other symptoms, my doctor says to stay put. Health care workers need them. High risk individuals need them. She thanks me for staying home. And so I have. For a month, I’ve been more or less in this bed. Not heartsick this time as much as just sick. Afterall, I was on the East Coast on book tour, shaking a lot of hands, giving and getting a lot of hugs. Before the phrase I don’t want to think about kept us from each other.
When I need to leave my room, I do it with stealth even though I want to hug my children so badly. I get up in the early morning, make my tea and bring a plate of fruit up to bed, while they’re still asleep. I don’t want them to not be able to smell, never mind breathe.
I pass their rooms, their doors closed like it’s ten years ago and I have breakfast and bag lunches to make and carpool to drive. But they know how to do all of that themselves now. They have Zoom work calls, and online courses. They’re happy my bedroom door is shut. They’re not used to seeing me every day anyway. They don’t need me sitting on their beds asking deep questions. They’re just as disoriented as I’ve been, only in reverse. They’ve been on full fledge. Now they’re home in their rooms with the trophies and the stickers and the posters. This was not the plan.
They came home with twenty-four hours’ notice. “We want to get through this at home.”
Salve, not salt, in the mother wound. I’m glad I kept their rooms dusted.
But how can I possibly be glad for this personal gain? The world has stopped. We are in global pain and it’s a lot bigger than my little Empty Nest issues. People are dying from an invisible enemy. I know this about enemies: it helps to look into their eyes. To wonder how we are the same. To practice on those eyes— our love and our empathy, and yes our fear and anger.
This one has no eyes.
I keep mine closed and admit my dirty secret to myself: I am so deeply grateful that my house has a family in it again. And I am the mother of it. I’ve missed it so. I wonder how many other single mothers are feeling this way right now, their adult children suddenly at home. A guilty pleasure. I feel like a glutton. Like I’m hoarding my children. Like I’ve somehow kidnapped them. Like…don’t admit this don’t admit this…I don’t want this to be over.
And that’s another reason why I don’t want to open my eyes. If I open them, and face the day, I have to face this too. Of course, I don’t want people to die. But I don’t want my daily motherhood to die again either. I feel despicable.
I try to imagine this enemy’s eyes so I can say to them what millions of people are saying all over the world: “GO NOW!”
And if I could look into those eyes, I’d add a small secret whimper: “Thank you for bringing my children home. It’s been the gift I never knew I’d be given. I’ve loved cooking all our family meals and laughing about our family jokes and talking in our family way with these older, wiser versions of my little children. But seriously…it’s time to leave our planet alone, silver linings and all.”
I truly try to picture those eyes so I can stare them down. Instead, I picture health care workers’ weary, woeful eyes above their dirty masks, and I want to drop to my knees at the side of my bed and thank them. That’s the gratitude I should be practicing right now.
And for this: I’m feeling better today. I have some energy. And I can breathe. And I can smell. “Thank you,” I whisper to every force of love and goodness I can conjure.
Now I hear this: Get on your knees.
I’ve only heard this a handful of times in my life, and when I do, I obey. My grandmother was on her knees by her bed with her hands clasped every night of her life.
I keep my eyes shut tight, and slide to the floor, and on my knees I give thanks for these people who are fighting this eyeless enemy which has taken so much and so many. And I give thanks for my returning health.
And on my knees with my eyes closed, it occurs to me that I need to give thanks to this enemy not just for my children being home, but for what it has given to our world too. Dolphins in Venice. Greenhouse gas emissions down. Air quality up. Dogs getting adopted. The elderly getting phone calls. Gratitude for our teachers— not just a mug or a plant on Teacher Appreciation Day. Gratitude for open space, parks, wilderness. Birds. Not just on Earth Day. And this word we throw around: community. Global community. Never have we globally had to face head-on the same common crisis. My father used to say, “The problem with your generation is that you haven’t had a world war.” I never knew what he was talking about. I do now.
With the exception of this Empty Nest thing, I’m a silver lining kind of person. So I say it out loud. “Silver lining.” And then the dark cloud comes back in. The thing that I am on my knees cursing and thanking.
“Go now,” I whisper. “We are limping but we will learn your lessons. It’s time for you to go.”
I kneel there and wonder what force I am speaking to with such conviction. The Covid-19 enemy? God? Mother Nature? Myself? It doesn’t much matter. The fact that I’m on my knees does.
Now I definitely smell coffee. When did they get old enough to want coffee? It was hot cocoa two seconds ago.
And I get this Christmas morning feeling in my belly, and a flood of thoughts rush in all at once, no observance of the dam I have worked so hard to build: What will I cook for them today? What new thing will we learn? Maybe they’ll say yes to a slow walk in the woods to test my energy. The fresh air will do us all good. Maybe it will be a beautiful blue sky day. Maybe we’ll read a book together. They used to love reading books with me. And singing and playing instruments before they got driver’s licenses and left to be with their friends. Like normal teens. But maybe they’ll be like they used to be today. Maybe they’ll want to be with me.
I squeeze my eyes tight against this nonsensical longing.
And maybe it’s because I’m on my knees, or because my eyes are still closed, but my mind starts wanting to hug the whole world: We have bread. And coffee. And a family in a house. None of us is alone. Imagine the mothers whose young adult children are alone. Imagine the single mothers who are alone without their children. Imagine the single mothers who are at home with their small children. Out of work. Or trying to work from home. Or pivoting their entire businesses with no food in the cupboard. Imagine being the mother of a brand new baby, born into this time of global unrest. Imagine being pregnant right now. Imagine being in a hospital delivering a baby without your loved ones. Imagine being in a hospital dying without your loved ones.
The same voice that told me to kneel, now says this: You can’t take on the world’s pain. But you can let go of your own by feeling past your own small room. Feel what there is to feel. But don’t sit in it so long that you forget how to heal. Or forget that you can heal. At some point, you have to open your eyes.
It sounds remarkably like my motherhood voice. And I realize that this month in solitude and sickness with none of my usual jobs or usual anything has turned me into a wallowing mess.
And sometimes…we need to wallow.
The door opens then.
My eyes open.
I stand.
There are my son and daughter. He’s holding a tulip in a vase. She’s holding a tray with a cup of tea and some toast on my favorite plate.
Our toast. That we took turns stretching and folding and baking.
I smile, get back into bed, and say, “Thank you!”
They place the tray at the end of my bed and sit in the window seat where I used to let them sleep sometimes when they were little and sick. I measure. Six feet away.
I take a bite of the toast. “You know, you could live on this bread. The sourdough ferments the flour and it’s full of all sorts of health. Funny how bacteria creates life. But you have to feed the starter to keep it alive. So it can do its work.”
They look out the window at the trees and into the hills like they haven’t seen this view in far too long.
I want to freeze time. But everything must move.
I sip my tea and force myself not to break this moment with mothering. Just to observe silence and togetherness and calm.
But I wonder so many things. I wonder what this virus will create in the way of living. For the whole world. And for my world. When I’m the one in the kitchen and the only smells that come from it are made by me. Because that will happen again sooner than later.
I look out the window too. At the view I have seen exclusively for months, and secretly all winter. I decide that when that word alone comes in with its haunt, I will remember this: I have a Mason jar of life in my home that needs to be fed.
And I’ll remember this too: there are always people who like a loaf of homemade bread, once we can see people again. Touch them. Hold them. Look into their eyes.
I look into my children’s eyes and say, “Thank you.”
“You look like you’re feeling a bit better,” my daughter says. “You needed to take a break and rest, Mom. Maybe this has been a blessing in disguise.”
“You should take it easy though,” my son says in his worried voice.
This is one of those moments that a mother of young adults can so easily ruin by wanting too much from it. From them.
But I don’t care. It’s worth the risk. I haven’t hugged them in a month. And I need this exact version of a hug.
“Can I read you a story?” I ask, looking at my collection of children’s books on my bedroom bookshelf.
They look at each other. I can tell they want to roll their eyes and say no. But this is the time of Covid-19. What else is there to say but, “Yes.”
I ask them to pick a book.
They pick one of our old favorites and pass it to me across the rug.
I reach down, where I have just been kneeling, and I open the book, smiling, not crying.
And I read.
And they listen. Really listen.
And I promise myself:
To get on my knees more often.
To make bread.
And to eat it. Alone or not.
To be well.
To stay safe.
To believe in silver linings.
Now Booking my 2024 Haven Writing Retreats! Email me to set up an introductory phone call: laura@lauramunson.com
- March 20-24, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- May 1-5, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- May 28- June 2, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- June 5- 9, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- September 25-September 29, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- October 23-27, 2024 NOW BOOKING
- October 30 – November 3, 2024 NOW BOOKING
by Laura Munson | Jan 28, 2022 | Motherhood
Last fall, on a family Zoom call with my adult children, my twenty-five year old daughter said,
“Let’s do Christmas differently this year. Let’s not spend money on presents or decorations or on our big Christmas party. Let’s have an experience! Just us.”
My twenty-one year old son said, “I agree. We have enough stuff. Let’s go somewhere and have an adventure!” And then he added, “Just us.”
It seemed like there was a bit more to it from both of them. A hint of: while it’s still just ‘us.’
I’ve never pressured them to get married nor to have children, but they have said repeatedly, unsolicited, since they were little, that they want to one day be married and have children. And in that moment looking into their cyberly translated faces, I realized that if this was to be true, the window for “just us” time might very well be closing in. Who knew how life would unfold for any of us, but it was true that twenty-year olds can go from being “under your wing” to fully fledged fast, and with that full-fledging comes responsibilities. New people in their lives, new commitments, new places, new roles, new traditions. New identity. New iterations of “us.”
I, of course, want that for them, if it’s indeed what they want. I have never been a grabby, helicopter-ish mother. But the more I considered their “just us” point on that Zoom call, the more I felt something like desperation…tinged with a bit of panic. I’d held our “just us” so dear for the last decade. Perhaps it owed to the fact that when a family with two parents in it becomes a family with one parent taking on new, foreign roles…and pulls it off against the odds…there’s a bit of a victory dance in order. A deep bow.
Maybe that was part of their plea? Or part of why I heartily and happily and quickly shed my traditional holiday contortions and said, “I’m totally open to that! Where do you want to go? What adventure would you like to have this Christmas and New Year? I have a special fund that I’ve been saving for something like this.” Maybe that “rainy day” was here.
With gaining emotion, I couldn’t resist catering to the pressing shelf-life of this “just us.” In fact, the more we discussed it, this trip/adventure felt like a necessity. One, lovely, memory-building, and even lavish, “last” adventure. It stopped me flat: This really could be the last time that we have a rich family adventure without anyone else but us. In our weird humor and propensity to laugh at only things we feel comfortable laughing at, just us.
After two years of a global pandemic and the subsequent lockdowns and travel restrictions, it even seemed dire. Afterall, the Delta variant was calming down. It seemed like the exact time to make this bold move into trusting the wider world again, and ourselves in it. Who knew what was around the corner, Covid-wise, on top of the next chapter of our individual lives? And we are travel people. I raised them this way. They took the baton. Now who were we out there in the world?
That pitter-patter of an ensuing trip upped my heartbeat. So I put something on the table. “How about someplace warm? Like Costa Rica? The Bahamas? The Maldives?”
Silence. Their eyes looked away from their screens.
“Or wherever,” I added. Card promptly taken off the table. I’d learned from practice that it’s best not to project, expect, and over-plan vacations when it comes to working with young people. A mother’s heart can get so utterly smashed by teenagers and even college-aged kids.
I thought about how to present or frame this “just us adventure” and came up blank. Not because I didn’t have countless ideas. But because I wasn’t sure I knew their definition of adventure anymore. When they were little, yes. But who were these young people now in the realm of their independence? What was the best meeting point with them? It dawned on me that I didn’t really know how to co-create with them at this stage of their lives, especially when it came to the holidays. We weren’t cutting out snowflakes for the living room windows. Or deep in the woods looking for the perfect Christmas tree. Or canning homegrown tomatoes for Christmas presents. Those mothering years were likely in the rear-view-mirror.
Who were we now? This “just us.”
It seemed like questions were the way to find out. Not controlling overtures, persuasive arguments, calls to action, or matriarchal mandate like early motherhood can require. So I put it out there: “What experience do you want to have? What’s your definition of a holiday adventure?”
I saw their eyes engage again, their minds cranking.
If we were going to have a successful adventure, I needed to go slowly. Let them have a say. Listen to their thoughts. Invite them to help plan. Let go of mothering patterns from the past. This was a time for “just us” to merge our minds and dreams and create a new bond for the future. And likely even a new way to each other.
It felt wonderful and scary. Don’t overthink it, Laura. Yeah, well, that’s a very nice thought in theory, but there was a lot at stake. A lot more than how full the Christmas tree is and how thoughtful the stocking contents and how good the nog. Those were controllables. Well, except the year the tree fell down in the middle of the living room and broke most of the ornaments, a lot of them beloved family heirlooms. That went from crushing to hilarious. It’s still hilarious. Makes us all belly-laugh.
I decided that more than anything, we needed belly-laughing. Life had become so serious. Ensuing college graduation and ensuing job hunt, Covid-challenged learning and athletic events, job lay-offs, paused business moves, cancelled book tour, and on and on.
A bit of motherly history: I’ve been planning itineraries for family travel since my children were babies. I’ve always been committed to the “be” mentality vs. the “do” mentality. Especially when they’re young. I wanted them to love travel. To be happy and curious and playful in a museum. A park. A restaurant. A city street (Montana spawn), a subway car, an airplane cabin, all of it. So I made sure that there were windows to just…be in those places. To go to a cheese shop and a bakery and everyone pick out one special nibbly bit, spread out a blanket in a park, have a picnic, and people watch. To go to the Art Institute of Chicago (my stomping ground) and choose a theme. “Let’s see how many birds we can find in paintings. We’ll keep a tally and whoever spies the most gets a special treat from the gift shop.” I wasn’t much for bribery, but they both knew I couldn’t resist a museum gift shop anyway, so it was a fun-forward game rather than a greed-based one. Usually they forgot about the bribe part anyway. We got lost in the fun. Mission accomplished.
But how to plan a vacation with adult children, one still in college, in a global pandemic? With restrictions changing on a dime, country by country? Would we be able to interact with locals at all, in their neighborhoods and free-flowing vernacular, or would it only be hotel employees, on their best professional behavior? We wanted the real deal. We were hoping for small B&B’s where we could really connect with other travelers and families, swapping stories in an intimate setting. We weren’t interested in big hotels, which seemed to be the only option given all the closures.
They were on the same page. My daughter said, “Let’s go somewhere easy. We always choose challenging places. I mean, I want to climb mountains in Nepal. But how about we leave that for later. I just need a break. Somewhere happy.”
My son perked up. “I can’t imagine spending Christmas somewhere warm. We should go for cozy.”
“What about Ireland?” my daughter said. “That’s cozy. Singing in pubs and sipping hot whiskey…”
“Christmas in Killarney!” all three of us said and laughed. “With aaaaaaaal of the folks at home!”
Smiles x3. More please!
Over the next few weeks, we each added our dream druthers to our group text feed. I had to hold back on naming the feed Just Us. I mean…I want them to like me.
The opinions started to roll in, warning us against international travel with this new Omicron variant. We wondered: should we wait until life was back to “normal?” It’s a big trip from Montana, after all. Lots of airplanes and layovers, and large expenditures. We took heart in the mask mandates and proof of double jabs at all pubs, restaurants, hotels, and some shops, and that the country was much lower on Covid than many others. Still…
Maybe it was because of the unsolicited opinion roll-out that we started to act tribally, the three of us. The world can’t stop because of a virus. There’s no good reason not to go. Even if we get Covid, despite our vaccinations and boosters, and have to quarantine over there, we’ll turn it into an adventure.
Here was how our text feed went: (no attributions, but you can probably figure out who wrote what)
I’ve heard that the golf courses are pretty sweet over there.
I’ve heard that the Dingle Peninsula is a must.
I’m in it for the jigs and reels and sea shanties.
Guinness.
A city hit in Dublin for sure. I miss the city.
No language barrier. I miss really connecting with people in different cultures.
Distillery Tour.
James Joyce land. John O’Donohue land. Yeats land…
Irish Whiskey tasting.
I want to ride a Connemara horse on the beach!
Pubs.
100% pubs.
Pubs for sure.
Well, we agreed on that. Pubs. In different iterations.
Mine: I was in it for the full-blown, wind-blown pub scene. Gatherings with locals, in spirted, heart-swept, impromptu singing. A tin whistle. Fiddles. A bodhran drum. An accordion. Maybe after a long hike in the countryside, or a long coastal drive. I could just see us wandering into a roadside pub, lanterns lit in an otherwise moody, grey landscape, Irish eyes smiling and asking us if we’d like something good to eat and drink. Lamb pie. Black pudding. Kindred wanderers and locals all bellying up for the same reason. Have a chat. Have a song. Have a pint. Know that they’re not alone, at least in that communal moment that the Irish are known to do so well. Maybe even get some inspiration and write the beginnings of a novel on a Guinness coaster. Go home full. New. A revived confidence in human connection. Really, my very favorite things on earth. Especially after so much isolation these last two years.
That’s what I was in it for, anyway. And I was pretty sure that these young adults’ vision wouldn’t be far away from my own. We are extroverts. Who love live, impromptu music and singing. Who love to connect with strangers. And who aren’t shy around beer. Yes, we would go for the people and the jolly public house culture—the perfect way to get to know my young adults in an informal and fun way. Plus, the belly-laughing. I pictured us belly-laughing in pubs across Ireland after long days of sightseeing.
So I booked it.
Five days prior to our departure I called a family Zoom meeting: “Well, I have some good news, and some bad news. Hint: Guinness.”
That got their attention.
“Good news! Our holiday trip to Ireland is still on!” I paused a moment, not sure how to break the rest of the news to them. “The bad news is…the Irish government just mandated that the pubs and restaurants close at 8:00. Sooo…”
Them: Silence. Perhaps some muttered expletives.
“That’s okay, right? We’ll still explore the countryside and coast. We’ll still meet people. We’ll still have fun. We’ll still be just us.”
“But will there be fun music before 8:00?” one said.
The other: “I kinda doubt it.”
“We’ll have a blast no matter what! We all need a major change of scenery.”
They agreed. I have highly flexible and adaptive children. Of that I am sure.
So on December 22nd we boarded a plane to Dublin, double-masked, double-jabbed, boosted, and with all the papers to prove it.
As I awoke to the green patchwork of the Irish countryside, I looked out my airplane window, thinking: What if the ‘just us’ that we find is really just a manifestation of the past and not a vibrant present, much less future? What if we really don’t know how to be together at all? Not having the pub scene as our playing ground will have us really present with one another. I hope that’s a good thing. Jet-lag messes with me. I shook it out of my mind and put on my best “just us” face.
What I didn’t quite bargain for, was the large amount of driving I’d signed up for.
On the other side of the road. The steering wheel on the right. And while both of my children are great drivers, the rental car agency wouldn’t approve them, given their age. So it was all me. And that was okay. I’m a confident and good and adaptive driver. I mean, I drive Montana roads all winter. I can do anything, right? I thought, as I nearly backed into a post leaving the parking garage. I was hellbent on not being your typical clueless American driver. I’d get this other side of the road thing figured out in seconds flat. Just you watch me. I stared into the first Dublin round-about with steely reserve. And then the next. And the next.
I’ll paint you the picture; spare you the details:
It was roundabout after roundabout and all in the “opposite direction.” So it wasn’t just linear learning. It was a life-threatening matter of clock-wise vs. counter-clockwise. I’ve never been good with clocks. I didn’t realize that I am also, most definitely, directionally challenged. And given the time of year, each day our return drive was in the total dark, often with very little street light, giving the optical illusion that you are about to get in a head-on every time you pass a car. Stone walls on either side. No shoulder. And for some crazy reason, at the suggested speed of 80 kph? That’s around 50 mph. There is honestly no way you could drive those windy, dark roads at 80 kph. Not even if you know them like the back of your hand. Again, I’m an excellent driver and I’m here to say: People who are used to driving on the right side of the road should be required to take a course for driving on the left. And vice the verse. Serious.
On a lighter note, because remember, that’s what our little trio was going for:
Think: Mr. Magoo, circa 1970s Saturday morning cartoons.
Nary a scrape, but a couple serious close calls.
“MOM! You almost hit that SHEEP!”
“MOM! You almost hit that ROCK WALL!”
“MOM! YOU ALMOST HIT THAT MAN!”
“MOM! THIS IS THE WRONG LANE!”
“MOM! MERGE! NOW! NO! NOT IN THAT DIRECTION! GO THE OTHER DIRECTION!”
“MOM! GO LEFT! I MEAN RIGHT! I MEAN SH**! THAT WAY!” Pointing with both hands in opposite directions like the Scarecrow in Wizard of Oz. Apparently it wasn’t just me that was directionally challenged.
It’s one thing to be told where to go. But I’ve never been good at being yelled at. Even though they were correct to do so! I mean it was dangerous!
But to yell at someone who is trying like the dickens to keep herself calm…doesn’t work for me. At all. I started to retaliate. Plus, I didn’t need the stress! What about this “just us” thing? Frankly, this felt like a blood-sport version of their teenaged years. But the truth was, and we all knew it, that there was no possible way I could have done it without them. Which started to churn and bubble in me. I’m an independent, highly competent woman. Did this mean that I wouldn’t be able to pull off a driving trip in Ireland solo? Or the UK? Or Australia? And if that was true, what about more challenging places in which to drive. With a language barrier. Completely different customs. Like…Beirut. Should I check Beirut off the list? I really want to go to Beirut. Would I have to stick to New England for fall foliage or Napa for wine-tasting crawls? Was I going to be an old lady on a bus tour???
“MOM! Are you seriously considering parallel parking right now?”
“I’m an EXCELLENT parallel parker! Watch me!” Failed attempt. Directional brain explosion. “Just kidding! This is like Groundhog Day Opposite Day!” That got a laugh.
At one point my son, wearing his airplane neck pillow, dozing in and out like he was in a video game, said, pointing to his sister playing navigator in the “passenger seat” front left: “Well as far as I can see, no one’s driving the car at all. So there’s that.” And went back to sleep.
“MOM! Stop ducking and gasping every time you pass a truck! It’s freaking us out!”
“FINE! I’LL SING DANNY BOY then! Operatically! If that would make you FEEL BETTER! This driving on the left side of the road thing ain’t fer sissies!!!”
Silence. They really don’t see me on full freak out mode very often. Because I don’t go on full freak out mode very often.
Then, from my son: “What even is Danny Boy?”
“It’s an Irish song. If the pubs were open past 8:00, you’d know it well. Grrrr…”
My son chimed in again. “How do I know that song?”
“I don’t know. But every Irish grandfather sings it at weddings and cries.” And then a massive semi careened by, and I held the wheel and sang in my best Pavarotti, Oh, Danny Boy…the pipes the pipes…”
“MOM! Stop singing and DRIVE!”
Son again, just before dropping off to sleep. Again: “Oh I know! It’s the song that Jay sings on Modern Family.”
I wanted to be back at the hotel with a nice Irishman delivering me a pot of nice Irish tea. In front of a nice peat moss fire. The nice Irish chauffeur at the ready for tomorrow’s driving adventure.
Ha. Ha.
But there was one moment which was the confluence of it all.
And it secured our future in just the pitch perfect way, sans fiddle, tin whistles, bodhran, accordion. And with me at the steering wheel.
It was broad daylight. We were driving the Dingle Peninsula. We were wind-blown-away by the beauty. The ancient beehive huts. The ocean foam. The cliffs, all accompanied by the sea shanties we’d cued up on our playlists, pub music or no pub music. We were happy. We’d gotten over the original stress of the driving and navigational challenges and had settled into a family of three “just us” rhythm. But nature calls…and sometimes suddenly.
In tandem. “I have to pee!” They could have been five years old.
“Why didn’t you go when we got gas?”
“We didn’t have to pee then!”
“That was only like fifteen minutes ago!” Grrrrrrrr…
Of course there was no gas station in sight. We were in the middle of a windswept coast with sheep and endless loose stack rock walls.
“Can’t you wait?”
“NO! I’m going to pee in my pants if we don’t stop. Just stop!”
Grrrrrr…
I looked for a place to pull over, Montana style.
Picture a tiny car on tiny roads. Golf cart sized roads. Surely this wasn’t a public thoroughfare. So I made a varsity move and pulled into a small, muddy gulley, hoping we wouldn’t get stuck or offend a sheep herder. Surely nature’s call was universal, but leave it to the Americans to sully the otherwise unsullied landscape.
“How about here?” I said.
“Fine!” they both yelled.
They leapt out of the car and suddenly it all became hilarious. I’ll spare the TMI details, but suffice it to say that all of the stress of the driving, all the bottling it up inside of me, all of the victim thoughts of why do I have to be the only responsible adult, and likely years of unprocessed junk…combusted. I went stand-up. Full-on crazy woman. Screaming at her children on the side of the road, mocking them, flinging shotgun expletives their way, letting it all rip so over-the-top red-faced and loose-lipped that sheep were staring at me. Luckily not herders. All this from the driver’s seat.
The kids got back into the car. They thought it was hilarious. Mommy has come un-done. Their laughter put me over the edge.
As I rounded the last lap of my not-so-tongue-in-cheek rant, something to the tune of: “So if I’m not driving exactly perfectly, then you can SUCK IT because I’m pretty sure that I’m pulling off one freaking INCREDIBLE trip of a lifetime vacation JUST US! So you can go…”
And then I stopped short. Because in that moment, in the side mirror, I saw a woman walking down the lane, holding a small child’s hand, behind her, a man, with a baby in a front papoose. Where on earth did they even come from? No houses or towns for miles??? They both instinctively shielded their children from the insane woman parked in the gulley, not at all understanding that it was all a big loud ugly American Mommy joke.
So I screamed out, (because surely that would help the situation), “I SWEAR I’M NOT CRAZY! I’M JUST YELLING AT MY ADULT CHILDREN! IT’S A JOKE. WE’RE ON HOLIDAY AND WE’RE JUST BEING SILLY! I PROMISE!”
They squinted at me like I was landing an alien spaceship on their otherwise bucolic landscape.
I tried to come up with something that would make them understand but came up empty. Only this, and pointing at them with ferocity:
“JUST…YOU…WAIT!”
That was the first belly-laugh. All the stress turned into explosions of nervous laughter. That “just us” belly-laugh bloomed one after the next all the way through our holiday, and back. We shared our belly-laugh stories with our friends upon return. They got smiles. Not belly-laughs. Guess you had to be there.
And so, it was a bit sad this morning to see this news, not because I wasn’t overjoyed for pub owners and employees and all who frequent them, but because we had so much fun, so much singing, so many Irish smiling eyes, and so many family laughs…well…before eight o’clock. Pubs and restaurants are back to normal in Ireland, for now.
And despite it all, we had our own “normal.” Just us. Who knows what comes next… We’ll be there to ensure belly-laughing!
- March 23 – 27 (one spot left)
- May 4 – 8 (one spot left)
- June 8 – 12 (filling fast)
- June 15 – 19 (filling fast)
- September 14 – 18 (now booking)
- September 28 – October 2 (now booking)
- October 26 – 30 (now booking)
by Laura Munson | May 16, 2021 | Motherhood
Now booking Haven Writing Retreats this fall!!
There’s still room…but spaces are filling fast. People are STARVED for the healing power of small gatherings, writing, self-expression, and Montana…
Click here for more info and to set up an introductory phone call.
- September 8 – 12, 2021 (still room)
- September 15 – 19, 2021 (one spot left)
- October 27 – 31, 2021 (still room)
As seen on Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper
Well…it’s over. I took off my apron today and the house is quiet again. Just a 50+ year old and two white dogs staring into each others’ confused eyes.
Goodbye to our “Long Spring Break,” as my 21 and 25 year old like to call it.
My young adult children have been home, for the most part, since March 13th 2020— the day I prematurely ended my book tour, came home to Montana, and bought beans, rice, and toilet paper like everyone else. The day I realized I didn’t have a job until some blurry time in the future when people can come on writing retreats in Montana again. The day my son realized that he didn’t have a baseball season or a college life. The day my daughter realized that she didn’t have to pay a Queen’s wage for rent in San Francisco, and could work remotely from her childhood bedroom, replete with PB Teen décor and plastic Breyer horses.
That first night of our Long Spring Break, we sat at the kitchen table and I spoke to them like a football coach— loud, strained, focused, and severe. And afraid. I’d never used that voice before. They looked at me like I was an alien. I was. I didn’t know how to parent young adult children. They had fledged, whether or not I liked it. And I’d gotten used to their new lives and my own.
I did know how to cook for adult children, however. Make the house pretty for the holidays. Stock the refrigerator to pre-empt hangry how-could-you We don’t have any sandwich meat??? eruptions. I knew how to take my young adult children on vacations and laugh with them and relax with them and explore with them. Not knock on their doors to ask them what this Zoom thing is and how to use it, only to hear, “Hang on! I’m on a conference call.” Or “Hang on! I’m in class.” Just standing there in the upstairs hallway in my pajamas with two closed doors and two kids on Zoom, and me with no Zoom knowledge and knowing I needed that knowledge in order to create a new way to work. Only to find out that we don’t have enough wifi for all three of us to be online. So guess who took priority? The one with a job, and the one in school. Not the suddenly jobless mother.
Fear set in. Suddenly I wished I’d been more Ma Ingalls and raised my kids more like the homesteaders who lived off this land in the 1800s. We were more “gentleman” homesteaders. We’ve liked our electricity and running water. I mean…what if the sh** really did hit the fan? And we were on these 20 acres, with no real working homestead skills? It’s true: I know a lot more about rural living than most of the people I was raised with in the suburbs of Chicago. But if we were really looking at surviving out here, the three of us…? I wonder. We only have water if we have electricity, given our well and its electricity-driven pump, and the power goes out seemingly at will. We live miles from town so suddenly our world became our 20 acres and we had to start thinking like homesteaders. I was sorry that I’d given away my old horse. He’d be a champ in all this. No longer was there anything fancy in our freezer or pantry. Like lamb. Or scallops. Or avocados. Turns out, you can do a lot with beans and rice. Suddenly I was buying vegetable seeds, never mind hand sanitizer. There wasn’t any left on the shelves anyway. Suddenly I was thinking about the illusion of power.
And with all of that…came all of them. The 20+ year-olds. All knocked out of their lives as they’d been living them.
They needed a place to shelter in place. And I never would have dreamed how much I needed them. Their confidence, their strength, their willingness to help, their gratitude. And yes, each of them with their own form of Montananess.
A few of them knew about trucks. Others were great with an axe and a maul and a hatchet. All of them knew how to make a mean bonfire. Of course they did. I knew that there were springs on my property that the homesteaders used. If we needed to fashion a pump and carry water, I knew that they could. And would. Maybe we’d start a commune to wait this out and I’d be their Ma Ingalls.
They came willing to help, but also like 20+ year olds do: hungry. They came with their Montananess too— with tents and sleeping bags in their trucks—the ones their mothers drove them to pre-school in, now banged up and looking a lot like the way we all felt. They were smack dab in the middle of their happy college years. Some of them had planned to go abroad. Others had hard-won internships in cities. Some of them were loving their classes and teachers and illuminating conversation. All denied.
Suddenly the only thing that made sense to them was land. Montana land. Old friends. And a house where they could hang their socially-distanced hat for a while “until things get back to normal.”
I always told my kids that it would happen. “Someday, you’ll actually like living out of town. Someday you and your friends will love this cozy house and this firepit and our land. They’ll want to be here. Mark my words.” Their eyes would glaze over while I went on and on about this house that we built and have lived in for now 20+ years. With all its happy scars from country living: the floors scratched by dozens of dog nails, dents from highchair-flung sippy cups, and handprints on the ceiling from post-mudpie couch traversing. Good clean fun.
Well, I suppose you could call our Long Spring Break “good clean fun.” Suddenly they were hauling cedar chips to spread around the fire pit, and positioning camping chairs around it to “make it nice.” They put beauty into this thing called sheltering in place. These are respectful kids. They say please and thank you. They clean up after themselves. Sometimes when I join them at the firepit, they chant “Laur-A Laur-A” and that makes me ridiculously happy. (There may be beer involved. They’re college kids. And they’re of age. And they stay put. It was a different story when they were underage. Ma Ingalls is a lot more tolerant!)
But what they seemed to like even more than their red cup adventures and bonfires, was the fact that they knew they were living in an extreme time in extreme beauty, and never had they felt such gratitude for it. I saw it in their eyes. They found snow wherever they could and they played in it, with or without a chairlift. They were suddenly happy to UP-hill ski and take one long, luxurious and deserving ski DOWN instead of constantly checking how much “vert” they’d gotten after a high-speed quad lift up the mountain, and super-fast “shredding” in the “pow pow” down. That was in March.
Then when the snow melted, the backpacks came out. The kayaks. The “Bye, Mom. We’re going into the Bob Marshall Wilderness for a 5 or 6 day backpacking trip. There won’t be any cell phone service. We’ll text when we’re on our way back.” And I just sat here, watching this parade of young seekers. “Getting after it” as we say around here, but now they truly were. And yes, they’d return, pitch their tents, make those bonfires. Get out the grill pan. Bring out the hamburgers or the chicken or the fish they’d caught. I’ve never heard such laughter. They needed that laughter and they needed each other and they needed some land to hold their loss and their fear of their futures. And their fun. It might even be…that these young adults needed me. That…felt new. And very very good.
Then summer ended and the cold came and so we took the fun inside. The same pod, all Covid free. All very careful to remain so. There began the slumber parties and the endless cooking. I pretty much wore an apron the whole time. By then I’d pivoted my career and was able to take my work online, and shower our little pod of 20+ year-olds with as much kitchen love as I could. And that’s a lot.
Over and over again I heard “Thank you so much!” “Can I help?” “What can I do?” Over and over again I showed them things that they didn’t seem to care about when they were teens. Like how to cut an onion. How to stretch and fold sourdough. How to make smashed potatoes. Anna potatoes. Any potatoes. 20+ year-olds really like potatoes. Guitars came out. The lonely piano was played by fingers that hadn’t touched ivories since Suzuki days. They dug deep into the game drawers and laughed as they pulled out old Nerf gun pellets and superballs and race cars and yarn. Up came Sorry, Clue, Monopoly, Scattergories, Taboo, Scrabble, puzzles.
The kids came home and the house started moving— the ping pong table, the firepit, the garage, the game drawer, the instruments, the kitchen, the hearth.
This was the part I loved most: When the kids got too cold, or too hungry, or the smoke to eye-stingy, or their bladders too full, they came into the house. To a kitchen full of food and a woodstove full of flame, and they plopped down on the couch and talked to me. They wanted to talk. Yes they’d spent all day skiing or climbing mountains or on the river, but they knew that all of this would one day stop. And life would resume. And what would that be like? Who would we all be after all of this? Did they really want to go back to college and leave Montana? Did they really want to go back to a bashed and bloodied world? Was college even necessary? Were we all better for the pandemic? Had we learned things that we needed to learn? Of course we had. Mostly, what I saw, was that they had learned true gratitude. Deep, raw gratitude.
It felt important to remind them, when they were really down in the dumps, of what it was to live in a time of the Draft. My father, a man from a small industrial town in central Illinois, was drafted out of his Harvard Business School dream during World War II after only one semester, and thrown into basic training, not knowing if and when he’d be sent overseas. He never quite got over that.
“Yeah,” they’d say, in somber tones of honor. “At least we don’t have to worry about that.” Pre-pandemic, I don’t think they’d stop to ponder that. Really ponder that. And honor it.
I have to believe that this pandemic pod has lived it with memories that they never would have given themselves if it wasn’t for this uncertain world. They made their world certain and took it to the mountains, rivers, lakes, and yes…to my 20 acres. They laughed and played and had long talks and real thank yous and tearful goodbyes when their colleges/workplaces opened up and it was time to go back to their other lives.
The house is empty now. With one 50+ year-old woman and two white dogs in it. The apron is covered in flour and grease, hanging on the broom closet knob. I’m not going to wash it for a while. I miss being their Ma Ingalls. I miss them. But I’m glad they are out in the world again, whatever that world has to offer them. I know that they will seize it like they never would have, pre-pandemic. But I also know that they are better for having had each other during this time. And this land. And even me.
I know it, because just now, I found a circle of heart-shaped rocks by the fire-pit.
by Laura Munson | Aug 17, 2020 | Motherhood
I originally published this piece with Covey Club and I re-read it this morning to remind myself that it’s okay to dream about the future in exotic ways. After five months of a very full nest, after a very empty one, I’m back to living solo. The last time this happened, I hit the road. Spent a month in Morocco, and two weeks in Spain. I’m so grateful for that trip and for all that it showed me in the way of wandering, and in the way of fortitude. Now…this sort of wanderlustful travel isn’t really an option. So I wonder, for those of us newly in empty nest, how to travel at home. I am lucky to live in Montana where I can wander in the woods. But with so much going on in the world, sometimes the only place I want to wander is downstairs to make tea. And then to wander out to the porch and wander in my watching. Spiderwebs glistening in the grass. A hornet’s nest humming and growing in the corner. A chipmunk chirping in the woodpile. A red-tailed hawk riding thermals off the ridge. And then to close my eyes and wander in my mind, wherever it takes me, exotic travel or not. Then some word wandering: a pen and my journal, or a splayed open book. That all feels like travel to me now. I’m not sure when I’ll be on a plane going somewhere far away again. Not many of us are. But there are places to wander right in front of us. And lessons to learn from stopping and watching and isolation. That said, this morning on my porch with my tea, reading about a time of being boldly outside of my comfort zone gave me faith that it will happen again. That I still have that fortitude. And that the world is still out there. It’s just a time for taking stock. And so many of us are doing it in solitude. Let’s have it be sacred.
Here is that essay. I hope it helps.
She mourned her kids moving on. And then she flew the nest herself.
Ten years ago, I watched my Montana friend go through Empty Nest. Her solution: drive a massive ice-breaking truck at the McMurdo Research Center in Antarctica (because she’s a badass). She brought some home-made hula hoops too (because she’s the maker of fun), and a few instruments, (because she knows the power of music). She faced Empty Nest with the same electrifying spirit and adventure with which she’d raised her boy and girl…and now they were off to see the world, replete with bad-assery, fun, and music. And she was too.
Back then, my boy and girl were still thick in the throes of music lessons and sporting events and homework at the kitchen table and weekend slumber parties. I couldn’t imagine letting them fledge the nest, much less myself. Not like that. I was sad for her, even though I knew she’d come back with tales to tell and more life experience under her frost-bitten belt. But I felt like she was running away from the grief. I mentioned it to another friend and she said, “Are you kidding? Motherhood is great. But you’re always a mother, even after they leave. It’s just different. Your kids are onto new things. And you get your life back! Reclaim it!”
My life back? I felt like I was finally getting the life I’d dreamed about. Being a mother was the most fulfilling thing I’d ever done. Sure, I’d travelled all over Europe and the Eastern Bloc in my teens and twenties with a backpack. Intrepid, stubborn, solo, and full of wonder. Writing my way through it all. But it felt like all of that was preparation for the most hair-raising, plot-twisting, heart-warming, soul-feeding work of my life: raising children.
And I did it well. For twenty-two years. The last stint, as a single mother.
And here I am. My boy is off to college. He’s got a great roommate and will be living out his dream playing baseball at an institute of higher learning. My daughter just graduated from college and moved into an apartment in San Francisco. She’s got a great job, great friends. A mother couldn’t be more proud. We both moved him in. My daughter flew back to California. I flew back to my house in Montana. It’s over. That part. And I’m afraid of the grief. I’m afraid of who I’ll be without them. Here. In my empty nest in Montana. But I’m not here for long.
Just like my friend…I anticipated this pain and tried to prepare. Two years ago, I started imagining the next chapter of my life. The fear of Empty Nest had me by the throat, but I took my friend’s lead and my other friend’s comment, and I decided that I was going to grab this chapter by the ponytail and yank the weeping woman attached to it back out into the world. To trust-fall into travel and adventure, as the woman she is now.
So this winter, I’m hitting the road. I’m going to live my own version of breaking the ice in Antarctica with my own version of hula-hoops and instruments: my journal and a group of seekers. I’ve started a new Haven Writing Program: Haven Wander. My primary programs still take place here in Montana, but for people who are less writing focused and more travel focused, I offer a new adventure to exotic places around the globe. With the help of some fabulous and inspiring locals from Marrakesh, I have put together a week of intentional wandering around Morocco using writing as our guide. It will be a feast for the senses and soul, with a component of giving back. I want to reconnect with my stubborn young dreamer/traveller. I know that her confidence and curiosity are still in me. And I want to meet her with the wisdom she’s gathered along the way as a mother and as a woman and an author and teacher. I want to scoop her up and tell her that she doesn’t have to do this next phase alone. She can do it in the company of kindred souls.
I’ve learned that you don’t have to live with an empty next. Empty nest, can be a moveable feast. And you can feather it with a small group of women who are just as curious and hungry for connection as you are. Who long to have their senses activated in a rich and deep way, and who want to fill their souls with powerful and meaningful experiences, especially using the written word.
So my new baby, Haven Wander: Morocco, is hatching this February. Seven women will join me on a 7-day journey of intentional living and being, using writing as our guide. And before that, I’ll travel throughout Morocco alone. To the Atlas Mountains. The Blue City. Fez. Tangiers. I’ll see southern Spain, and take the ferry across from Gibraltar. I’ll be solo and as Joni Mitchell wrote, “unfettered and alive.” Deep sigh. It’s been a long time since I’ve been that woman. I’ve missed her.
Before all of this, however, I’m taking a very deliberate and very serious pause between my own chapters. A full stop to honor my transition. And I think that this is vital for all of us in Empty Nest, no matter how we navigate it.
I’m borrowing from the Jewish tradition of sitting shiva. Of mourning. Of stopping your world and observing your loss and your grief. I’ll light a candle and sit on low chairs around the house and reflect in thought and prayer, and write. No TV. No computer screens. Just observations of my motherhood and of who these children of mine have been. I’ll sit shiva for the learning to crawl and learning to walk and learning to speak and running barefoot in the grass and swinging on the swing set and making mud pies. I’ll sit shiva for piano lessons and guitar lessons and school plays and orchestra concerts and soccer games and track meets and football games and baseball, baseball, baseball. I’ll sit shiva for all the birthday balloons I put on the garden archway and the streamers taped to the corners of the porch. I’ll sit shiva for the pony rides in the front yard and the badminton, and the croquet, and bocce, and backgammon and cards and Farkle and Scrabble and Bananagrams played on the screened porch by candlelight. For all the bonfires and marshmallows and star-gazing in sleeping bags on the dewy cool grass. For every ahhhhh to every shooting star.
And then, on the seventh day, I’ll take a walk around all four corners of my twenty acres, and then return to my front porch to symbolize my return to society. I may even call my rabbi friend to read these customary words from the Old Testament:
No more will your sun set, nor your moon be darkened, for God will be an eternal light for you, and your days of mourning shall end. (Isaiah 60:20)
My kids have always said, “Mom. You walk so confidently without having any idea where you’re going. You even walk confidently in the wrong direction.” They’re making fun of me, of course. Millennials have never lived life without their noses in their GPS screens, robots telling them where to turn.
“I know where I’m going,” I’ve always told them. Even when I don’t, I still have deep faith in my ability to find my way. “Maybe it’s the sea merchants in our lineage,” I tell them. Who knows.
They part laugh, part roll their eyes.
But they don’t know that me I used to be, without them. So I tell them now: “You two are the joys of my life. I’ve loved every minute of mothering you. And now…it’s time for me,” I try to convince myself.
I press into the bruise of Empty Nest, begging myself to truly believe it. And it erupts out of me. “The truth is…I’m tired of trying to be everything for everybody. I’m tired of being so responsible. Of having a life where everything has to be so full and stacked and go go go. And perfect. We were so good, the three of us. I’m so proud of us. I’m so proud of you two! And now…I need to have room in my life to just…wander for a while. I’m going to Spain and Morocco for a few months this winter. I’m going to work there. Do one of my Haven programs. I’ll be back. Don’t you worry.” I smile at them, and try not to cry. They hate it when I cry. “I need this. I hope…if you have children…that you’ll have this time of reclaiming yourself too.”
Their faces fade. Perhaps the way mine did when my friend announced her Antarctica adventure. They think that it’s nice, their mother wanting to travel. But they are startled by this gung-ho fling-the-windows-open mother I’ve been, now pushing all of us out the door at once….as a woman. By my simultaneous flight from the empty nest and how we all need to fledge now, perhaps to be better when we come back home.
Here’s what I know and what gives me permission: I can’t get that old life back. I’ve experienced the last graduation. The last family boat ride of the last summer. The last bonfire with his buddies. The last home game. The last of everything.
So I’m replacing those lasts with new firsts: with wandering the spice markets of Marrakech for the ingredients for the tagines we’re going to cook with a world-renowned chef, with learning the history of tea, and having a special tour of the Medina. Riding camels. Sitting in olive groves and in cafes and writing with fellow seekers.
Motherhood never ends. But this phase of my motherhood is over. What better way of honoring it than by re-introducing myself to myself in a far-away place. In that case, today, in my own backyard in Montana, alone, I think I’ll take a deep bow. No one has asked me to. And I’m not going to wait for them to. It’s the bow that I have to give to myself. For now. And as the birds migrate…I know that soon, I will be migrating too.
by Laura Munson | Jul 18, 2020 | Motherhood
I wrote this twenty-three years ago, as a new mother, at the end of a long Montana summer day…
It was my first published piece and I still love it. The kids are off on their own now, climbing mountains into their own setting suns. The world is a different place, and yet we’re still the same. Enjoy!
It is summer in Montana and it is past our collective bedtime, but we are driving into a sky glowing burnt orange, steel green mountains not yet silhouettes. The days are full here, too full, maybe. There is a three month panic to be scantily clothed and to wave the limbs around in hot air, in water, on a sweaty horse’s back. Suddenly there is so much sun after so much snow and grey matte sky and it’s a drug we agree to take in overdose. I don’t wear sunblock. Neither does my husband. We slather our baby in it, but let the undersides of our arms rest on the hot black paint of the car door while the tops– all the way to our fingers– in-between our fingers, bake in high-noon sun; then on our foreheads and backs at the lake in sparkling water, on hot rose rocks, on alpine trails, in meadows of lupine, Indian paintbrush, yarrow, huckleberries. With red and purple-stained skin pulsing sweet dried sweat over the throb of cooling highway, we cover our tracks back, turning off fourteen dead, fifty injured in a bombing today in an Israeli market; hold hands, try to find the moon.
Look. A star, I say, letting go of his hand, pointing. Yeah, he says. Two of them. That one’s bright. I wonder if it’s a planet. Wondering, I reach back for my baby’s hand without looking, craving a little loose bundle of fingers. There is a soft sigh from the back seat and I get my offering. Everything to her is this kind of sky. A chirping squirrel is still as full of wonder for her as the stars popping out over the blue Jewel Basin one way, the pale orange still hanging over the Canadian Rockies, the other. I close my eyes a moment; a small prayer in honor of squirrels. I want wonder.
There is heartbreak in all this.
I fight to be there, under the gaining stars, not to consider the end of this day’s light a misfortune.
It doesn’t have to be a death. It doesn’t have to make me think about tomorrow. I flirt with the story of the market bombing– picture a mother handling tomatoes, her son slipping an orange into his pants– fight the image of their bleeding bodies lying splayed and still in the dirt, covered in blown-up tomato pulp. No. I hold my baby’s hand tighter and weave a few of her fingers into mine. They’re sticky with huckleberry juice. I feel the stinging of sunburn on my back, minus an X. I mouth, I am here…I am here. The wonder does not have to be scary. She’s not scared. She is singing. I peek back to see what she is doing with this closing darkness. She is fingering the window. Counting stars. Feeling glass. Drawing pictures with her saliva. She is where I want to be.
I look at my husband’s face. It is the color of the Whitefish range: the last coal. He likes the window down halfway. He likes total silence. He is driving. He is where I want to be. Earlier, in the hardware store parking lot, I wait in the car with my daughter asleep in her car-seat, checking to see that the seatbelt is not cutting off her breathing. How can she breathe slumped over like that, her head to her belly? But she does– I can see her shoulders rising and falling. In-between checks, I stare at puddle mirages in the hot pavement, at women in passenger seats on the diagonal, all lined up; babies sleeping behind them. They are checking too, staring at mirages. One by one they click into ready position, their husbands walking proud and purposeful with a new hammer, a bag of fertilizer, dandelion killer. I am waiting for bear mace– red pepper spray, as if that would do anything, a grizzly bear bounding at us, our baby in the backpack singing to the bear, a cliff behind us, my husband reaching to his belt for his pathetic weapon. Play dead…play dead…play that woman and her son with tomatoes all over them in Israel, frozen, watching paw over paw hurl toward me over lupine and Indian paintbrush and yarrow, huckleberries. But I don’t know about the market bombing yet. And there is no bear. But I don’t know that yet either, sitting in the car in the hardware store parking lot.
The day is done.
Pepper spray– check. Pants and a sweater for later– check. Teva’s for the beach– check. Sunblock for the baby, three extra diapers, wipes, baby food, sun hat, a change of clothes for her, life vest– check check check check check check check. Back pack, fanny pack, water bottles, trail mix, sunglasses, camera– all checks. Bathing suits, towels, beach-blanket, rafts– yep. A cooler full of cold beer, sandwiches and whole milk in baby bottles– done. Gas– we’ll get some. Where are my sunglasses? Have you seen my sunglasses? Oops, forgot the keys. Where the hell are my sunglasses? On top of your head. Oh. We need bear mace. That stuff costs forty bucks…you have a better chance being killed in a car wreck than by a griz, anyway. Put your seatbelt on…we’re getting bear mace– we have a kid now. All right all right all right. The day is done. We used everything but the pepper spray. I look at my husband, still losing light at the same rate as the Whitefish range, and feel safe and in love with him for carrying the baby in the backpack, the mace on his belt, pumping the gas– little things he wouldn’t want to know I loved him for. Little things that free me up to think about breathing and seat belts and bleeding bodies covered in tomatoes, and grizzly bears. I let go of my baby’s hand and reach for his again. He is where I want to be.
It’s all stars now. They call it big sky and they’re right. What are you thinking about? I whisper. Nothing, he says. I sit there and try to think of nothing, watching headlights come at us at seventy miles per hour on my baby’s side, pull at my seatbelt quietly to see if it would really stop me, nothing…nothing… I look back to see if she’s asleep. She is. I reach my hand back and rest it on her chest. She is breathing. Nothing…nothing… I put the same hand on my shoulder and feel the hot from the sunburn. My mother has had five melanomas removed from not wearing sunblock. Nothing…
I am left with my breathing. Check. My heart beat. Check. A raven sky.
Countless lights twinkling…God, they really do twinkle. Twinkle twinkle little star— I figure out that it’s the same tune as the alphabet song. And then I am left without songs, because one of the stars loses itself in dust and falls right in front of us, right on the highway. We pass where I think it has fallen and look for stardust and leftover glow, but there is just an old cracked double yellow line. Did you see that? I say. The star? he says. And I look for another; pick one and stare at it, ready to see it go down. But the longer I stare at one, the more I see all around it, and none fall, and it doesn’t matter, because I’m going deeper and deeper into the biggest sky I have ever seen, and I have lived here for years now, and I’m not thinking about that either. I am lost, in star after star after star after star…after star. After star. And I am there, wherever that is.
by Laura Munson | Aug 11, 2019 | Motherhood
For those of you who are looking at the last weeks of August with dread, clinging to what last licks of summer magic you can put in your proverbial jar and hoard in your proverbial pantry all winter…and especially for those of you who are facing Empty Nest for the first time, and ESPECIALLY if you are a single mother facing Empty Nest for the first time…this is for you. But it also applies to anyone who is longing for her/his people, in the wane of these sacred summer days:
First, a word on this emotional miasma that you are likely feeling: (followed by some pretty solid advice…so stop what you’re doing. Get comfy. This is a muscular read and there’s a good chance that it will help you. A lot.)
There is so much longing in these dog days of August, especially if you are a mother of a child soon fledging the nest. Longing for things like that one moment on the porch with your college-bound son, before he goes out with his friends, AGAIN…trying to squeeze out some lovely mother moment in which you impart just a bit of wisdom, or ask that one perfect question that will evoke that one poignant answer and you’ll feel like you know your child again, or just that much more.
Maybe you have ways to inspire these moments and maybe it has to do with food. So maybe you find yourself plotting a menu that he can’t resist so that your home will be the chosen roost for his boy squad tonight, not some cabin in the woods, or some boat on a lake, or some media room with air conditioning and very lenient parents… Maybe you should be a more lenient parent? Nah.
Or maybe you are just plain longing for your child. Without all those tall smelly (albeit adorable) boys who quite likely have one thing on their mind: beer. Maybe you just want him. At home. Before he leaves for college, and you’re alone in the house. Alone. Wondering why you didn’t make summer matter more. Why you didn’t insist that he come home, miss the party, sit on the porch with you and play cards and talk all about life and love and loss and hope. Why you didn’t swim in more lakes together or establish a daily something together that when you are older you can both say, lovingly and longingly into each others’ eyes: “Remember that summer when we used to always ________?”
And not have this as your memory instead: “Remember that summer when we used to always say, Bye. Have fun. Be smart. Be safe.” Or, “Can you mow the lawn before you leave? And weedwack?” Or “Gas money? Sure. I’ve got a twenty in my wallet. Help yourself.” Because why wouldn’t you give him a little gas money here and there. He plays baseball. He’s hard to employ. And the only spare vehicle you have for him to drive is the old gas-guzzling Suburban. You live in the country. He needs a car. Everything he wants to do is far away from home. And it’s expensive to get anywhere in that old beat up truck. And yet…as much as you wish he would stay at home, you’re glad he has places to go and people to see. And yeah…it feels good to give him a little financial relief. It’s summer. He’s a good kid. He works hard at college. You’re proud of him. And gas money is like your Bolognese sauce. Which means you love him just that much more. And no…none of it is bribery. It’s just making life for your child a little luxurious every so often. Because you’re his mother. Damn it. You’re his mother.
Since he’s been little, you’ve made it your job to teach him every lesson you can possibly think of, although you doubt he listened to you. Tick tock! Before he goes to college, you need to know where he is in life! You need to take the pulse of his heart and mind and soul! So you ply him with your Bolognese and it works: He gives you that precious time. For one splendid dinner. And you sit on the porch and see what he knows, where he is in what he knows, where he needs to know more. But then you have to go and blow it because you push just…a…little…too…hard. And he wolfs down the rest of his food and asks for gas money and is off to a cabin in the woods with his buddies and the cooler his very cool god-mother gave him for Christmas.
“Have fun. Be smart. Be safe.” And you hold back the tears because he hates it when you cry. He feels guilty for leaving you alone and you don’t want him to. So you swallow and shake it off and holler after him, “I love you!” And then you go inside before he can peel out of the driveway, because you want him to think that you have things to do. Only you don’t. Not really. Not unless you call doing the dishes “things to do.”
For those of you who know exactly what I mean…clinging to these last weeks of summer before your child leaves for college…and especially for those of you who are doing this for the first time…take heart. I’m a year ahead of you, and I have some help for you. Wipe those tears. Make a cup of tea. Get cozy…really cozy. This is for you:
1) First of all, don’t feel ashamed that you are in this amount of pain. Yeah yeah yeah…people will go to great lengths to remind you that you had kids to see them fledge. You don’t want them living in your basement! But we all know that this doesn’t help, any more than it did when your mother told you to finish your dinner because there are starving people in Africa. Now you just feel bad about yourself. Try this instead:
2) Go into his room when he’s not there and take a photo of his clothes all over the floor, his un-made bed, the zillions of chords and devices that you don’t really understand or want to understand. And then take a look at whatever’s under his bed that you haven’t wanted to see all summer. Take a photo of that too. Ew. Now put those photos on your screensaver. Take a good look at them. Do these images endear themselves to you? Didn’t think so. When you pass by his room after he’s gone, and you fall to your knees weeping because it’s so clean and vacant and innocent with all those baseball trophies, and his Lego trucks still intact and GOD how you miss those days…take a look at those photos. Should do the trick.
3) You know how when you’re at the grocery store checking out and you can choose to get some cash…and you get $20 in case he asks you for gas money? Because who carries cash these days? But cash is maternal currency and you always keep some around for that moment when he looks up at you like a starving kid in Africa, or at least a Golden Retriever, and says, “Any chance you have any cash for gas? I’m pretty low.” And you get all lit up inside because you can say, “In fact I do. Happy to help the cause.” Like you’re thrilled that he’s leaving you once again. You know that $20. I know you do.
- So here are your marching orders from a mommy who knows: Keep taking those twenty-dollar bills at the grocery store checkout line. Only it’s not for your kid’s gas money any more. It’s now officially, starting the week before he leaves…massage money. $20 in a secret compartment in your wallet. Watch it add up. I bet you can afford a massage every other week if you give yourself the money you would have given him to drive away from your front porch. How ‘bout that! Does that get you all lit up inside? I’m sitting here smiling at the thought of it. I’m totally going to try it! Wish I’d thought of it same time last year!
4) So…you know all those times when you get the guts to ask, “Wanna go out for lunch?” or “Want to go to dinner and a movie?” or “Want to take a hike in the woods?” And he says, “I’m sorry, but I already have plans.” And you feel like such a sucker, loser, chump? Well when he’s gone and you feel that longing for bonding with a loved one…it’s time to text or email or call or choose one of the fifteen thousand ways that you can contact a friend these days. AND ASK THEM if they want to do any of the above. It might not be exactly what you wanted to do, and it might not hold the emotional holy grail of mother/child love that will quell that ache in your heart. But heck—it’s better than sitting around at your shitty pity party. So there. Reach out to a friend. If they say no, reach out to another one. It’s better than being alone when you feel like that. Being alone shouldn’t be something you bully yourself to do. If you don’t want to be alone…don’t be alone. The world is a peopled place. Find your people. Just maybe not overly happy people at this juncture.
5) To that end: On being alone. You’ve heard this by now, I’m sure of it. “I love being alone! I’d DIE to have my house to myself. I could do anything I wanted! Damn! I’m so jealous of you. I can’t WAIT until Empty Nest. My kids are driving me crazy. And you’re not in a relationship right now? Sounds like HEAVEN! I’d crank tunes and have a naked dance party, just me!” Well here’s my advice: Stop talking to those people. They suck.
6) If you don’t have a dog, you should probably get one. But if you start buying little sweaters for it, and custom-design a doggy bed that matches your couch, you should probably hire a shrink or a life coach or something.
7) Now’s the time to write that book you’ve always wanted to write. I know a gal in Montana who can help you… Just sayin’. #havenwritingretreats
8) Or take that trip you’ve always wanted to take. “Alone?” “Yeah. Alone. Just to do it and see that you won’t die. Not that it’s better than traveling with a loving partner or your loving children. These people: “I would do ANYTHING to travel alone. I LOVE traveling alone. You can do whatever you WANT TO DO!” See my above advice.
9) To that end: Maybe just don’t hang out with people who are happily married and who are entering into Empty Nest. Not until you get used to going to bed alone, waking in the night alone, going downstairs in the morning to make tea and seeing everything exactly as it was the night before when you turned off the light. Even that piece of paper that you passed on the stairs and didn’t pick up. And then passed again on the way back up. And will keep passing until you finally get it through your head that unless you pick it up, it’s just gonna stay there. Maybe wait until you finally pick up the piece of paper before you consider hanging out with happily married Empty Nesters. Or maybe just stay away from them altogether until you can trust yourself socially.
10) Don’t trust yourself socially right now. Weird shit is going to come out of your mouth. And you can’t take it back. And it just adds to the shame. When you do the reach out to a friend thing…be very careful. You’re wide open. Like after birth. And death. This is a kind of dying, and you have to respect the grief process. Only hang out with people who understand that or who can find empathy for it.
11) Make your special Bolognese sauce, or your version of whatever is your culinary super power, and eat it. Alone. On your porch. With a really nice bottle of Cote du Rhone. Because these aren’t box wine days any more. You don’t have to pay for deli meat and bacon and a bread box full of English muffins, and bagels, and sandwich bread, a meat drawer full of big blocks of cheese, and all that protein and gluten he requires. You only really need the top shelf of the fridge these days. And it’s pretty slim. And it’s very clean. For once. Everything is very clean for once. When you do your cooking, be sure to dirty lots of pots and pans and plates. Then leave it all in the sink. When you wake up and go into the kitchen, you’ll remind yourself that there was some good old-fashioned living going on in this house of yours last night. And you have proof! Advanced homework: Leave it in the sink all day so that you can remind yourself, over and over, that Empty Nest is not turning you into a zombie. You still make (and eat) pasta Bolognese!
12) And here’s another thing. Not only are you not a zombie, but you’re actually living. So guess what? (And these are strict orders. I don’t care what’s in your bank account) You hire a HOUSE-KEEPER! At least once a month. And guess what? That one piece of paper on the stairs that you keep forgetting to pick up, or even passive aggressively LEAVE on the stairs to torture yourself with the fact that you are alone, and you’ve got the piece of paper to prove it…that piece of paper that you pass and every time your bleak mind skips to: I’m going to die alone…well guess what? Suddenly, there’s a nice woman with a vacuum cleaner in her hand, and she’s just voila sucking up that piece of paper, proving to you that you DON’T suck, (that’s the vacuum’s job haha)…and that sometimes you have to pay someone to remind you of that. (See: the therapist or life coach that you’ve hired. That massage you’re having on a regular basis in lieu of doling out gas money.) You’re going to start HIRING people. Not like you’re rolling in the dough, but all that actual dough that made all that bread that you don’t have to buy with your kid in college…well you’re going to put it to use to keep your heart from breaking.
13) Finally, and I’m a living testament to this: Your heart isn’t going to break. Not all the way. You’re going to race home from work or from wherever you are in your day, and think, “Crap. What do I have in the fridge and the pantry to make for dinner? He’s so hungry all the time!” And then you’re going to think, “Crap. It’s just me.” And you’re going to take a sigh, and slow your mind down, and slow your accelerator down, and you’re going to think… Huh. I’ve been wanting to see what this Outlander thing is all about. And I do have Netflix, after all. For him to watch whatever those scary boy shows are about the dead people. I wonder what else there is on Netflix. Maybe there’s a cooking show or something. Ah…and there you have it. You find A Chef’s Table. You find Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. And yes, you find Outlander, and you start wondering, after binge-watching the first season…if maybe you too could find a portal into another time, and find another you, and other people to love and who love you back. And you wonder…what’s possible for you in the future. Maybe this is the time of your life that you will one day look back on and think, Boy, did I ever have an easy, calm, self-centered (not in a bad way), life when I was in the throes of Empty Nest. Boy, was it uncomplicated. Boy, was I surprisingly happy. I’d do anything to have that Me-time back. In fact, I’d DIE to have all that sacred space, and everything just the way I want…
But for now, while he’s still home…you’ve got to get to the grocery store to buy more deli meat, and more bread, and get that extra $20 bill, and and and…pass by that piece of paper on the stairs and think, There’s a chance, albeit a small one, that maybe he’ll pick up that piece of paper. And if he does, or even if he doesn’t, I know that he loves this house, and all the memories it holds, and me too. And that he’ll come back. Of course he will. There’s Bolognese here. There’s a lawn and a weedwacker that he is proud to have dominion over. He loves his lawn. Our lawn. Who knows: maybe one day it’ll be his house. And maybe I’ll be living in the basement. Or in the studio over the garage. And he’ll be giving me gas money.
All I know is that I have to let August run its course. Not over-think it. Allow the moments to come naturally. Not force them. Be happy with those little in-between conversations over morning cereal. (That’s another thing you don’t have to buy anymore: cereal.) And believe that September will have its moments of grace along with its moments of despair. Please know…there’s nothing to be ashamed of. Yeah, you had kids, and you loved them with everything you had, and now you’re helping them fledge. That doesn’t make it any easier. At least not for you.
The ones who are DYING to be alone and DYING to have their kid out in the world—I suspect that they’ll collapse on their knees from time to time when they pass their child’s empty, clean, innocent room. But remember that when YOU do…just take a look at your screensaver. That room smelled bad. The kid in it did a lot of grumbling and mumbling and wasn’t always such a peach. That door was closed a lot with music thrumping on the other side that had words you couldn’t understand except for the ones you still can’t believe he knows and uses. You thought you imparted too much wisdom for him to listen to those words. Well…maybe you did. Maybe he listened, after all. You’ll find out.
It’s time to let summer go, and welcome September, despair and all. Maybe there’s a naked dance party in it for us! I promise you, as much as I can promise anything without having a crystal ball: There’s a strong likelihood that you’re going to make it. A year will go by and it will be next summer and you’ll be looking at your kid in the same way, and maybe your life too…but you will say to yourself: I lived. I somehow did this life alone, without being a daily parent. I somehow trusted my child to thrive. And he did. And I didn’t die. That’s what I’m putting my money on: That you and your child, apart, will thrive. Not just get by. But THRIVE!
So…go outside. Right now. Walk barefoot in the grass. Drink some lemonade. Watch the dragonflies mate. Feel your place in the natural order of motherhood. And be glad. You did a good job, Mama. You did a good job.
If you want to use writing to navigate your life too…come to a Haven Writing Retreat this September! I have rare spots available on the September 18-22, and 25th-29th retreats! Email me asap to set up a phone call to discuss your creative journey and the Haven experience: laura@lauramunson.com
Recent Comments