A stay-at-home mom considers the impending empty nest.
Some years ago when I was in the throes of my addiction to the good mother myth, when my life was all about getting kids to and from school, and running errands and doing laundry and walking the dog and feeding the cats and pulling together wholesome well-balanced meals with varied veggie colors and lean protein and a whole grain carb and maybe a side dish for the fussy eater so my kids grew properly and their brains developed appropriately. Basically the stage of my life when my greatest ambition was to make sure the whole damn world has whatever it needs at the expense often of my sanity, but certainly my truth. On one of those days I met a woman.
It was more of an encounter with her, this middle-aged, raven-haired beauty with the easy sense of calm and artfully experienced face that I aspire to some day, the picture of graceful aging and its well-earned friend, confidence. It was at the shoe repair shop, a tiny two-step down place on Sullivan street where I’d gone to retrieve my husband’s resoled shoes. And as any good multi-tasking mother will, I took the dog with me to get his walk in before the afternoon school pick-up. My dog, whom I do and will always adore, is a happy hound/lab mix who trots down the street as if the world is just the most amazing place and he’s got it by the tail. He seems almost to smile most of the…
