Life in the gray…

The little girl I nanny each week was a super snuggle bunny today. I can’t lie…I loved it. My motherly instincts are innate and I can’t deny the sweetness of a little girl snuggling her face into my thigh, my tummy, or my chest. There is something so tender and sweet in that moment that I feel I need a recorder, a warm cup of cocoa, and a fuzzy blanket so I can sit and relive it over and over again.

I can’t imagine what it would be like to be a mom. Well, actually, that’s probably a lie. I’ve been taking care of other people’s kids since I was fourteen so I think I have a pretty good grip on what it takes in actions to be a mom. The part that I can’t grasp is the heart part. My head is incapable of wrapping itself around the thought of creating something that is part of me, nurturing it, loving it every single moment of every day, and then eventually, letting it go. 

The past couple of weeks I have found myself grasping, clawing for, clinging to, and sprinting towards answers, management, knowledge, etc. I have wanted to know a lot of answers to things that I have no business asking for answers to. The reason is because these things that I’m looking for answers to are not mine to be found. 

The answers can only be found in the living. In the letting go.

These things are important, but they are certainly not my own flesh and bone. Trying to fathom letting that go seriously boggles my mind.

I was catching up with a friend last week and she was telling me how this guy she knew was basically his mother’s life. She was struggling with helping him see the dysfunction of the situation and help separate him in any way she could. 

As much as I can’t imagine relinquishing control of my kids’ lives, let me say (for the record) that I will do it. I do not intend for my children to be my life so that when they’re twenty-six and ready to move on, I’m clinging to them. (Just sayin’.)

For those mothers out there who have done this letting go gracefully and with poise, thank you and congratulations. You. Are. Awesome.

Isn’t that why it’s sometimes hard though? You want the answers? You want to know everything will be alright. You want to ensure that the formula — the poetic blend of discipline and grace, the boundaries, the rules, and the time spent — was all right. You search for the proof that A+B=C and C is good and where your child is. 

If you’re like me (which I’m sure you’re not because I imagine all my invisible internet friends are perfectly well adjusted and high functioning) this search for the black and white right answers can cripple you. You wait for the solution, the puzzle piece, or the matching attire, and it never comes. 

The problem is that a lot of the time there aren’t black and white answers. As much as we would like for our world to be black and white…it would be awfully blasé. Even the original Mickey Mouse cartoons had shades of gray. Without the gray space the world only makes sense in two dimensions: right and wrong. 

That is not our world. We live in the ebb and flow of right and wrong. We rides the waves of change, growth, and learn from our mistakes.

There is no formula, no perfect pattern. There is though, a lot of snuggles, mistakes to learn from, chances to take, lives to live, food to share, kisses to give, books to read, trips to take, moments to soak in, and times to dance. 

There is lots of gray to be made. 

For as much as I love color and pizzazz, I love gray just as much. I might even love gray more because gray is the good life. You don’t always get to know. You (just) get to live and see.

THIS is the song that has been playing in my head all day. Enjoy your Tuesday.