Are We There Yet?

Have you ever noticed that even if you have enough bathrooms in the house for every member of your family, your kids will still find a way to fight over who gets THIS ONE? "But Mom, my toothbrush is in this one." (So pick it up with your God-given little fingers and march into another bathroom before I throw your toothbrush out the window and make you go to school with fuzzy teeth.) "But Mom, I was here first." (And you can be the last, too, if you don't straighten up and realize that IT DOESN'T MATTER.) "But Mom...but Mom...but MOM!!!" You know, they should change the name of Calgon to "But MOM!"

Sophie went to school late today - heck, everybody did, because of the snow - and it threw the entire morning off. Bless 'er, she's used to moving around in the dark, like some cave lizard, and having light this morning affected her system so that the only remedy was sitting on the ottoman in the den and staring mindlessly at a TV cartoon. That is, until I blocked her view and told her to get dressed for the 5th time. After we got her off to school, Sam and I went to the grocery store to blow half a paycheck.

Now, our kids never really bug us on trips out of town with, "Are we there yet?" They do it during grocery-shopping trips. "Are we done yet?" You know, where there are other people in listening range so that you can't threaten them if they say it one more time. I usually manage to get at least one good threat in around the family-planning/feminine protection/incontinence aisle because no one wants to be caught loitering around THERE. So this is a typical trip:

Produce:
Sam: Are we done yet?
Me: No, honey, we just got started. See this long piece of paper? That's all the stuff we have to get.
Sam: Oh. (pause) Are we done yet?
Me: Here, have a potato. Play with that.

Aisle 2: breads, pastries, buns, and for some reason, dried cranberries.
Sam: Are we done yet?
Me: No.
Sam: (pause) Are we done yet?
Me: No. Look, dried cranberries!

(We skip Aisle 3 because it has baby stuff we don't need, but more importantly because it has toys.)

Aisle 4: juices, canned fruit, and ethnic foods
Me: Sam, do you want this juice [pointing at one] or that juice [pointing at another]?
Sam: Are we done yet?
Me: No, we're not. Which juice do you want?
Sam: Candy!
Me: God, give me strength.

Right about the time I'm ready to put him on the sidewalk with a "Free to Good Home" sign around his neck, some lady walks by and Sam turns on the charm. He beams when he sees her as if she's carrying the Holy Grail. Which, if she's got candy in her cart, she might be, come to think of it. He catches her eye, and just when she starts to smile at him, he ducks his head and grins. This makes her chuckle. She has forgotten about the angel-hair pasta she was looking for and is now concentrating fully on the adorable 4-year old flirting with her. He looks up, hunches his shoulders up by his ears, and laughs, sometimes putting his hands on his cheeks for extra effect. They chat for a minute, with Sam asking directions to the candy aisle, and they promise to keep in touch. She tells me, "What a sweet boy! You are so lucky!"

I really am lucky. I mean, I don't feel like it until we really ARE done (you should see us rocket out of the Dairy aisle, like we're at the Kentucky Derby and the cash register is the finish line), but I am lucky. Blessed is more like it. Sam keeps me on my toes. I don't know if it's because he's the second child or if it's because he's a boy (and I do mean ALL boy, frogs and snails and puppy dog tails), or if it's an unholy combination of the two. He's made me straighten up and be a better mother than I was the first time around. I can't slack off around him. Sophie's my rule-follower. She's self-sufficient, she obeys house rules, and it rarely occurs to her to deviate. I can tell her to make her own peanut-butter and honey sandwich without wondering how much it'll cost to get it out of the carpet...or the VCR...or the printer... If I gave Sam a jar of peanut butter and a jar of honey, AND A KNIFE, God help us all. Sophie's the kind of child where I can groan with relief and say, "Oh, good, now I can lay down and take a nap." Sam's the kind of child...well, let's just put it this way. When he gets older and has a sleepover, you don't want to be the first one asleep.

I recently watched a show that followed four unwed teenage mothers through pregnancy, delivery, and post-partum. It was very moving, deeply moving, to watch these children have to grow up so fast and face some very unpleasant realities, make some really hard choices. I felt tremendous compassion for these young ladies. One girl gave her child up for adoption, the other three girls kept their babies. They all worked like dogs to make something of their lives and, in the case of the last three girls, to take good care of their children every day. And without exception, while they each talked about how difficult it was, how every day was so overwhelming, they each also said that the love they had for these children is what got them through, what made each day bearable. I'm certainly not glamorizing being an unwed teenage mother, but these girls had figured out the secret: children make it worthwhile. They all desperately wished they had done it differently - waited until they were older, found a partner who would commit to sharing this life - but what was done, was done. They were shaken, shocked, and completely changed by the amount and depth of love they felt for their kids. And that's how I feel about Sam and Sophie. When Sophie's spilled something on the carpet and tried to clean it up herself by smearing it...it's still worth it. When Sam's played submarine in the bathtub and more water is on the floor than in the tub...it's still worth it. When they tag-team each other and ask me questions during my favorite TV show (but never during the commercials, notice)...it's worth it.

One time when Sophie was younger I asked her what she loved most about her life. I was expecting an answer like, "peanut butter" but instead she turned to look at me with those blue eyes and she said, "You" and made me cry. The other day Sam told me that I was his best friend. Considering he keeps company with Mickey Mouse, Special Agent Oso, and the Imagination Movers, that's high praise indeed.

"Are we there yet?" Oh, boy. We are sooooo there.