Motherhood and Other Natural Disasters

LOOKING FOR HARRIET NELSON

I find myself watching old reruns of the 1960’s television series “Ozzie and Harriet” with a sense of longing. I believe that what interests me the most are the sequences where Harriet and her neighbor sit at the kitchen table enjoying fresh cookies from the oven while drinking coffee. They obviously enjoy a close friendship and have time to share the details of their lives. Their families are the center of their existence, and they truly seem to enjoy life just that way.
Harriet Nelson, June Cleaver, and later Marian Cunningham were our television heroines, embodying the characteristics of the wife and mother I believed I would someday be. Somewhere along the line I was misinformed. Instead of joining the time-honored profession of motherhood full-time, I find I am squeezing it in between housework, personal interests and a part-time career. Sharing intimate details of my life is no longer done with friends on a face-to-face basis. Rather it is something done over the telephone, email or Facebook, usually while I am doing the dishes or laundry.
In reading a book on parenting, I found a quote that aptly describes the parenting experience:
“Parenting is something that happens while you are busy doing something else.” (Anonymous)
You never once saw Harriet Nelson come tearing out of the house, her clothes half-buttoned, her hair askew, without make-up, and hollering, “Come on kids, we’re late!”
Harriet Nelson was always on time. I, however, am a different story. Once upon a time, I too, was punctual, sometimes even arriving at my destination a few minutes early. That was “B.C.”, Before Children.” Now I am either barely on time, or notoriously late. If church starts at 10a.m., I can be counted on to slide down the aisle, and skid into the pew with less than 30 seconds until show-time. In fact, for awhile the congregation mistook me for a deacon, because I always seemed to follow the pastor down the aisle!
Once I wore that fine make-up “sold only in department stores”. Now, if I have time to put make-up on at all, I find myself digging out the last drops with a Q-Tip, making Mr. Scrooge look like a philanthropist. Once I thought that buying clothes from K-Mart was as contemptuous as buying them from a rummage sale. Now I find either alternative acceptable, simply glad to have something new to wear, regardless of where it came from!
I find myself alternately amused and disgusted by the television commercials where young models complain about those tiny lines around their eyes. They recommend the usage of their miracle anti-age cream, with an unspoken promise that “You, too, can look as good as me while you are complaining.” Well, perhaps all SHE needs is Oil of Olay, but I am pretty sure the only thing that will fill in these cracks is Plaster of Paris, or perhaps surgery.
Thanks to my two lovely children my once thin, lithe body has been replaced by a physique that any Sumu-wrestler would be proud of. It would seem that my prenatal cravings did not stop with the cutting of the umbilical cord. Instead, the cravings have become more defined; I don’t eat as much-just more often. Instead of inhaling the whole pizza, I find I can now contain myself to five or six pieces!
Prior to children, the word “diet” was a foreign language and overweight was a disease process that happened only to others. The concept of dieting has now become a permanent shadow, lurking around corners and staring accusingly at me just as I am about to dive into that heavenly turtle cheesecake. I can almost here my conscience speak to me, in a voice that sounds for just like a Jewish mother: “Well THAT will cost you a thousand sit-ups”, or “Why don’t you just rub it into your hips; that’s where it will go anyway!” I am beginning to understand how Pinocchio must have felt with Jiminy Cricket as his conscience, always trying to keep him out of trouble. I find myself wanting to bind and gag that still small voice who reminds me that Goodyear called this morning to see if they could use my body for blimp advertisements.
Surgery is definitely an option, but by the time they lift my face, augment my breasts and suck the fat out of my hips, thighs, and belly, the National Debt will seem a small price to pay in comparison.
Remember those carefree days of youth when you could lounge in a hot bubble bath, reading a sleazy novel while sipping an ice-cold cola? Me neither, but I know I used to do it. Now the closest I get to a hot bubble bath is when I yell, “Calgon, take me away!” Invariably someone comes in while I am bathing, lets all the warm air out of the bathroom, stinks up the room, finishes my coke, and leaves me with an empty glass in a cold room you can’t breathe in. If I’m lucky at least the book stays dry.
The bathroom has become a convention center, and no matter when I enter my “office”, it isn’t long before someone is knocking on the door asking how much longer I will be in there. I don’t are what time of day I try to have a few moments of privacy, (and believe me I’ve tried them all), someone inevitably knocks on the doors indicating a need for relief that somehow always exceeds my own. I have even tried leaving the lights off in the hopes that they won’t find me, but alas, they always do.
I can’t prove it, but I believe my son may be selling tickets into the bathroom. One day, one of my neighbor’s sons sauntered into the bathroom, saying he had been advised by my son that it was “O.K.” to come in. I would not have felt so bad except that when I came out of the bathroom, I found my son leaning up against the wall, wearing a maroon leather jacket, and chewing a toothpick, looking like a Hollywood pimp. I tell you, the kid’s watching too much television!