Mother's Day

How strange. How odd. This year, this is my day.

Gabriel is more than ten months old, and I still do a double take sometimes, and say, who's a mom? me? Sorry, you have the wrong chica.

But oh, wait. Yes I am. M-O-T-H-E-R.
I'm not quite sure why it stuns me so much to be a mother. I mean, I've wanted to have children since I was 15. We planned to have kids. I had nine months before Gabriel arrived to get used to it, and ten months after, to boot. Yet still, it surprises me.

I think it's because I spent so many years as such an independent, internally motivated person. It was always about what I needed to do for my life, my development, my art, my work. And now, well... hi, it's about sweet potato mash and diapers and nap schedules.

It's only about me during nap times, and at night, once he's gone to bed. And usually, by then I just crash.

Well, yesterday, I got myself a planner-- the old fashioned kind, on paper, with binder rings and a loop to hold my pen. I want to make sure that my old life hasn't finished with bringing forth a new life.

When I was still pregnant and distressed over my lack of ability to create, worried about whether or not I would be able to create once the baby came back, another woman told me, "don't worry, it comes back."

This is where I am now. Nurturing my creativity, while nurturing the baby, I am nurturing me.