Exactly What I Wanted

I was light headed and nauseous. Trying to focus. You'd think I was in the delivery room ready to give birth. Nope. Just a soccer mom, trying to plan the latest end-of-the-season party. When I signed up to volunteer, I thought 'How hard can it be?' I had completely forgotten the bake sale incident. It's like herding cats with flying money. Same scenario, different food.

I'm not complaining, not really. I had always wanted to be a mom. I had the maternal pulls in the grocery store when I'd pass moms with their babies perched on their shopping carts with yards of fabric and a tangle of security straps holding this person that was no bigger than a sack of flour in place. I would look longingly during my neighborhood jog at the kindergarten mid-day pick-up. The children holding construction paper works of art lathered in glitter and glue that would wave in the wind as parents dragged them to their SUVs. I had my own season of maternity wards, diapers, bottles and becoming a unique kind of detective that learned to master the art of distinguishing cries and locating toys.

So how did I get here? After spending the afternoon battling allergies on the soccer field while shouting cheers at the kids clad in cleats, I was now standing in line at the pizza parlor, picking up a tower of pizzas. The kids, whose volume had not reduced but actually increased, were peppering me with their orders.

"I'm allergic to peanuts." Fine, I don't think they make a peanut butter pizza.

"I don't like pineapple. Don't put any on mine." I don't actually make the pizza, so I suggest you choose another slice.

"I'm so hungry, can I have my own pizza?" That would be a 'no.'

"Pepperoni and olive is the only pizza that doesn't make me puke." I don't know what to do with that information.

With a headache beginning to threaten, I wrangle money from my purse as I accept the handful of cups a teenager from behind the counter gave me to distribute. I also get a handful of tokens for the game room that are actually minions of the energy gods to froth their adrenaline further.

Wearily, I make it to the table and try to stay inconspicuous as the coach launches into his thank-yous and season highlights. I listened as the coach called the kids up one by one to accept their participation trophy. When it was my son's turn, I snapped a photo and smiled as if he had just won an Olympic Gold medal. My weariness morphed into pride.

He ran straight to me with his trophy lifted high and demanded that I share his joy. Which I did, exuberantly. I held him tight in a bear hug, my heart bursting as I remembered the bundle of joy I brought home from the hospital nine years ago.

Without question, when the day is over, I know that I would do it all over again and love every minute of it. This was exactly the life I signed up for, dreamed for and the chaos that I will miss in the quiet retirement years. The trophy my son was clutching was mine as well. It represented loads of laundry, hundreds of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, permission slips, phone calls. Planning and executing nutritious dinners on-the-go, homework and play dates. Shopping and wrapping the perfect birthday gift, taxing the minivan to the next family outing.

The military has it wrong. It is not the toughest job you'll ever love, motherhood is. For all the times you think it is going to reduce you to a puddle on the floor, there is that dimension that you never knew you missed until it became a part of your world. To have someone call me mom, to be an integral part of their existence, the scrapbooks filled with pictures 'made just for me.' I was worth every minute of lot sleep and extra pound placed on my middle section.

I love my angels. They are truly a gift from God. Motherhood . . . ya' gotta try it.