A few days ago Abbey was watching Sesame Street, a tried and true favorite for generations, when a song came on that I remembered. It goes something like this:
"These are the people in your neighborhood, in your neighborhood, in your neighborhood oh, these are the people in your neighborhood, the people that you see each day." I've made up a new one for parents out there. It goes like this:
"Lisa, Judy, Eve and Paula, oh these are the parents of your kids friends, your kids friends, oh your kiiiiiiiiiiiids friends, oh these are the parents of your kids friends, the people that you see when you're walking down the street, oh the people that you see each day." Except the list goes on, and on. Mr. so and so, the soccer coach and Mrs. what's her name, last years coach. Lori, Audrey, or is it Ann, mothers you've run into dozens of times. Ali, Heidi, Cindy, gymnastics mothers all of them, but you can't remember who's name goes with who. I coached Jack's soccer team last year so that is a whole new bunch of parents names I should remember. Brenda, Emily, Michelle. In a small town, or maybe even any town, you start to run into the same circle of people. You see them at the school, at the park, at the playing fields. You see them at the one gas station in your town, or the library. Sometimes they are with children your kids seem to know and you recognize, other times they are with different children and then you are completely thrown. I didn't have this problem as much before Jack started school, you are more set apart. But once they hit that Elementary School, watch out! You know these people, have chatted with them at functions and events, and you know you have been introduced to them at one point but for the life of you can't fathom their name. And you know how when you have been introduced to someone once, and then proceed to see them like once a week for a year, you can't at that point be like "what's your name again?" Sometimes it is sufficient just to remember their children's names, if you can. "How is so and so liking kindergarten? Who did they get for a teacher?" But the children's names seem to outnumber the adults at least 2 to 1, so this can be more difficult.
It's a tough world out there on the homefront, you need a steel trap memory. Unfortunately for me, I don't, so I just smile with recognition at just about everyone I see, just one of the hundreds of smiling mothers out there, and hope I never have to call anyone by name!
My fabulous friend Suzy's twins started preschool this week, giving her a glorious 5 hours per week absolutely CHILD FREE! She has decided that this new lifestyle deserves a new theme song. I'm sure we have all felt this way at one point or another (and if we haven't, we should)!
I had another post all ready to go today, but I've preempted it. I had almost forgotten what day it was. Since Abbey had school I didn't even get into work until 9:30, and it was already past 10 when I realized. 7 years. Crazy. Those in our parents generation will never forget where they were the day Kennedy was shot, and for us we'll never forget where we were on 9/11. I was at work (the same place as today, again, not big on change). I was very newly pregnant with Jack, about 5 weeks, and so nauseated that it was all I could do to stop myself from puking into my wastebasket. I was eating saltines, constantly. I was watching the computer, listening to the news, everyone in my office congregating together, unable to do anything else, and the whole time I just kept shoving saltines into my mouth like some sort of crazed cartoon character. Everyone seemed to either know someone there, or know someone who knew someone, but I didn't. I had no relatives in New York, Washington or on the planes. No long lost friends from college or elementary school. Everyone I knew was safe and sound, but there was a new giant terrifying question of "how long?" How long would everyone I know be safe? And being pregnant, all I could think about was what kind of a world I was bringing a baby into. I had these dramatic visions of delivering in the middle of a war-torn suburb. Of Dennis marching off to fight, me alone wearing some sort of drab colored cape and babushka, clutching a newborn baby. Of course, these things did not happen. Things stayed fundamentally as they were, but they also changed in all ways that were important. The world changed, the safety we had felt was gone and it never returned. My children, and many of your children, were not even ALIVE before 9/11. They never knew a time when the Towers stood, will never know a world that doesn't include the word "terrorism" in its vocabulary. They are the post 9/11 generation, and I have no idea what that means for them.
