Zoo In Progress

I played soccer in college.  I was actually pretty decent at it too, and I loved nearly everything about it.  There were some things that I disliked... a lot.  I loathed the timed two mile (I never, in my life made that time, even when I was 12 and running cross-country, let alone at the ripe old age of 22).  I also hated when the coach would make us come up with goals.  Life goals.  Physical goals.  Goals.  I'm not a "big picture" person.  One of the reasons why I married Todd was so that he could do that for me because big picture is totally in his tool bag of strengths. But seriously, I don't make resolutions, I don't have benchmarks, and don't even think of asking me to set a deadline.  I'm terrible at endless possibility like an open calendar to just "pick" from.  I like boundaries, structure and frameworks.  I work well with the scaffolds of life firmly in place.

I recently joined a 'private' online group of mommies from all over the place.  I didn't realize when I was invited that I, with a 5 year old, would be one of the more senior moms in the place.  Some of the comments I've read have made me laugh out loud because after four babies, there's not much that ruffles my feathers anymore.  Other posts simply break my heart.  Not because they are so outrageous but because many of these moms with babies mere weeks old have more figured out than I did with two kids sitting on my pregnant bump.  How are they so much further down this parenthood path than I am?  How did they figure out the secrets to being a good mom in days, when it took me years?

And then, the question that is always asked when new moms get together came:  What do you wish you'd known before having kids?  There were the usual responses about sleep and spit-up and body changes.  But I sat and thought about this question that has honestly eluded me for half a decade.  My answer has nothing to do with sleep or kids or nappies/diapers or feedings or body-anything.  My answer:  I wish someone had taken me by the shoulders, shaken me a bit to get my full attention, and then forced me to plainly describe three things.
     
1.  What do you want your child's character to look like in 10 years?  15?  
What behaviors, activities, attributes and types of friends do I want them to have?  How will you go about fostering those in said child?  For instance, if I want my kids to be readers, what am I going to do in the next ten years to help bring out the reader in my child?
   
2.  What do you want your family to look like in 10 years?  15? Or how would you describe it?
This one would have changed a thousand decisions, big and small.  For example, if I'd actually realized I wanted more than one kid, I would have taken a second look at those strollers that can adjust to fit two kiddos.  But it also would have changed my expectations from myself, my husband, and my yet-unborn child.  If you know you want to be a family known for being relational, laid-back, and hospitable, I wouldn't have stressed for two years about my "routine" (because I wasn't one of THOSE mothers who put their kid on a schedule, oh the horror... who was I kidding?!).
     
3.  What do you want your children to say about you to their friends?
I still get hit between the eyes on this one.  I'm not so great at it.  I wish they would say A,B, and C.  While I think we've moved away from X, Y, and Z, I still think we're somewhere in the second middle of the alphabet.  Strangely, most of the things stated in #1 would be things I would want repeated here.   

But how do you get there?  Because, well, let's face it, I'm a slacker mommy.  I started this journey with the best of intentions.   But here, now, four kids and four year later (it doesn't matter how many times I admit to that, it still sounds so irresponsible to me!) I think I've come to embrace my inner slacker.  So this is me, publicly professing to being a slacker.  I slack on schedules.  I relish with a delight unknown outside of the realms of chocolate-love when the kids are on school holidays and lazy mornings.  I love when a child asks what we're going to do that day and I can answer, "I don't know.  What do you want to do?"  I slack on housework.  I slack on getting back in shape.  I slack on the educational stuff too, because, sometimes, I like for things to just come up.

This morning, I was moving (although not really awake )and I had counted a dozen questions already.  I had to instate a new rule.  Mommy gets to finish breakfast before the barrage of inquires begin.  I spent most of the day trying not to go insane from the tugging, screaming, whining and wailing that comes with a three snot-nosed preschoolers in confined quarters with a 5 year old who is so over everyone with the surname of Leslie... unless she can scheme someone else into trouble while angelically telling on said sibling.  But even then, in the midst of the dark underbelly of chaos that is our household, I thought of it again.  What do I want this family to look like?  I want it to look like avid readers... and so, we read.  And Em poked at my eye brows the whole time she wasn't sticking her head between my face and the book.  We read and Cooper built a train track out of books for a matchbox-sized toy train.  We read and Harper snuggled with her daddy.  And when my two chapters from the chosen book were over, and I was so irritated that the kids weren't even LISTENING, Em starts asking questions... about the book.  She asks about the characters and the storyline and then, she snuggles in and gives me one of those big wet kisses, the kind you have to school yourself not to wipe away because of the sheer volume of moisture.  That's when the unbearably tedious task of keeping this zoo of ours in order becomes something more... it became a snapshot of the the family I'd hoped for.  The family I'd wished for.  The family I had prayed for.

Some of these new moms from this internet group seem to have it.  They have their family ethos mapped out (see, despite what our family planning habits may point to, I did go to college).  In some ways, I envy them for knowing where they want to steer their ships.  Maybe if I had worked just a bit harder in college to get the whole discipline of goal-setting down in my soccer days my motherhood path would have been a bit smoother.  But even so, I wouldn't change what we're doing right now because I love my fellow zoo keeper more than anything and, I love our animals.  I think we may, possibly, have the best zoo-in-progress ever.  Maybe.