Sloppy Kisses

I often get caught up in the next thing.  Dreaming about our next house (and its green lush lawn), the ten thousand homemade lovelies I long to have the time and talent to create, planning details for the next big event.  I struggle to be perfectly content in the moment and be fully present in the precious fleeting childhood of my littles.  Why?  Why do I struggle to quiet my racing mind and just be?  To be fully engaged, to be fully present, to be fully available.

As a wise and wonderful friend admitted years ago, no one tells you that a lot of motherhood is boring.   

It's true the joys are endless, but sometimes the days feel endless too.

The first 5 times we read a new library book are fun, but reading number 2,876?  Boring.  Playing cars for billionth time?  Mind numbing.  Building the same exact tower of blocks again and again and again just to be knocked over?  Snooze fest.  I can feel myself checking out mentally.  I go to another place as my eyes glaze over and my body goes into autopilot.

Another lovely Momma friend and I have founded an "Anti-Apathy" support group.  We are bound and determined to fight the boredom and be engaged and fully present mothers.  Oh, but how I fail.  Time and again I fail.

The best way to bring me back?  A dose of the same medicine that caused my condition.  My sweet littles.  Yesterday, I lay on the floor in a stupor of exhaustion, boredom and frustration.  Samuel was busy crawling over, on and around me, content to have a personal jungle gym.  I was staring at the ceiling noting the strange shape of a lizard in the plaster while mentally counting the hours until bedtime.  Suddenly, a wet, open mouth was pressed against mine in a fit of giggles.  I snapped back to the land of the living and realized I was just given my first, uninitiated kiss by my little boy.  He pulled back, smiled at me, and kissed me over and over and over, both of us giggling all the while.  

Boring?  Not a bit.