Free Beer for Moms

"Hey Coach...you're a mom!  You should go over there and get your free beer."

I glanced up at the spray-painted sheet hanging from the porch of the self-declared party house, and pretended  I would actually take them up on it.

"That's true!  Do you think they meant me?"  I asked with an exaggerated tone as I took a few steps in the direction of the ad.

I stopped, of course. 

What kind of coach do you think I am?  More than that...what kind of mom do you think I am? I'm a respectable mother, wife and coach who holds herself to the highest standards of professionalism.  I don't think I'd ever be the mom who walked away from my kid as he/she unpacked his/her college things for a first year away at school just so I could have a few bevvies with a young good-looking college kid.  I'd have to be completely desperate, right?! There were moms who stopped, and I was so curious about why they did.  Were they single cougars looking for a young victim?  Were they frazzled, emotional wrecks who hoped that a free beer might calm the overwhelming emotions of saying goodbye?  I don't know. 

I also don't know the intentions of the young men who decided to wave the invitation in the first place.  Were they looking for single cougars who could dig in their claws?  Were they hoping to meet the "party" moms of daughters being delivered to school so they would have first dibs on a girl with good genes?  I can only guess why they invited the moms, but I grappled with what it feels like from a mom's perspective.

On one shoulder I heard the logical professional side of me: "Keep moving those things...smile and welcome all the students and their families...make them feel welcome...do everything you do with joy and treat them the way a good coach and mom should."  On the other shoulder I heard:  "Do it. Just walk over there.  Screw it all.  Would it kill you to lighten up a little? Those boys are sure creative if nothing else, and it would be fun."

Professional shoulder always wins out with me.  I probably always want it to, but there are days when I just wish I could go back to irresponsible, unprofessional me.  Oh wait... I never was one of those!  I told someone the other day how I wish I could just go back to college for one year.  A year when I wasn't worried about playing on a team...a year when I wasn't frantic about my GPA...a year when I could fully invest in getting to know the kinds of boys who dangle interesting messages on bed sheets.  Is this what mid-life crises feel like?  I would venture to guess that if the intensity with which I have felt these emotions the last couple of weeks increases steadily until my kids are heading off to college, the obnoxious, irresponsible shoulder may move my legs to actually cross the street to claim my free beer.

Our Friends Help Me to Love Him Better

They are who I call when I'm frustrated, when what my husband does drives me crazy, or when circumstances make marriage seemingly impossible.  They are the right people to call.  Our best couple friends absolutely support our marriage, and I don't think you can ever have enough friends like that.

Through hormonal tears and laughter about the changing phases of our lives, they have been our steady companions.  Our friends have seen us in different places in the country and they have always been one phone call away.  My girlfriends are important to my emotional health, and I lean on them too, but there is something so powerful about calling "a couple" for support and guidance.  It's funny that I feel doubly supported by our husband-wife friends, because I only call the women, but they are the type of couples who share everything, and I always feel like I am talking with the both of them with one phone call.  I know my story will be shared with the husband, and when I get that call back to check on how things are going, I can hear his input on the other line.

In our best couple-friends relationships I have a deep friendship with the woman and my husband is good friends with the man.  It is important for his friends to have a chance to remind me what makes him such a good guy.  They will defend him, and that is incredibly important to the strength of our marriage.  When I am not necessarily feeling like going to bat for him, our couple friends will.

My husband and I are approaching our twelfth anniversary, and we threaten practically every year to throw an anniversary bash that looks a whole lot like our wedding reception.  Part of why we want to do it is to have a chance to celebrate with the friends who have played such an integral part in our marriage.  One of my favorite pictures from our wedding reception is of the groomsmen holding me up.(the picture above is not me, nor is it anyone I know)  Many of the guys who physically held me that night, have been figuratively holding me ever since.  We have added other supportive guy friends to the mix, and with all that support, a bride/wife has a hard time falling.  When we get our anniversary bash organized, it will be a celebration of our years of marriage, but it will also be a chance to thank the friends who have consistently helped me love him.

Can I Bleach His Collar?

It has been fifty-four days since my husband has taken a full day off of work.  It isn't the sit-behind-your-desk or hide-inside-a-cubicle sort of work either.  It is demanding and physical, resulting in weight loss and fatigue.  He has probably lost about twenty-five pounds, and anyone who sees him this time of year notes how tired he looks.  He is tired...and skinny.  It has started to take a toll on him.

As his wife, I feel a sense of responsibility for his well-being.  "Have you eaten today?"  "Can you get home to get a nap?"  "Here is a gift of a massage...will you please go do it?"  I want so badly to wave my magic wand and turn his dirty t-shirts into white-collared business attire.  That might mean a five-day-a-week schedule, a steady paycheck, regular weekends and a well-rested husband.  A girl can dream, right?

I know to my core, that even if I could change the color of his collar, I couldn't change the worker inside.  My husband loves to work with his hands. He uses his down time (at our cabin) to build things and renovate. He enjoys the rigor of his job and the variety of the tasks.  What drives him hardest is the fact that working like this through the summer affords him the opportunity to do what he loves more than anything in this world: to coach hockey.

He's not a cubicle kid, and he wants to use his suit and tie money to buy the color-coordinated ensembles he can wear standing behind the bench.  It is not my right to deny him that.  It is what breathes life back in to him after he lays limp at the end of the summer.  I support him the only way I know how.  I shuttle kids from here to there.  I plan excursions and soothe frustrations.  I distract the kids and count with them the days until we can rest with him.

I took the girls to see Ramona and Beezus as part of my distraction technique yesterday.  I cried in so many places in the movie, and for completely different reasons.  There was a part in the movie where the dad explains how he was forced to take a "real" job after his kids were born so that he could support the family.  His passion for art was not a feasible means to an end.  The dad in our house has the same problem.  He has a passion that could not support our family of five right now, and he is married to a woman who wants nothing more than to write for peanuts.  Maybe I should don the white collar...and give him a chance to rest for a while?  I don't know whether we need a white collar in the house, or just some centering to get us back on a track with what works for everyone.

It's all still a work...in progress.