I knew from the moment my friend had posted the photos of her family’s trip to Lake Tahoe that I had to have it for myself.
These months of quarantine have been getting to us all,
and I just needed to get OUT.
So we planned the trip, and five days ago
we descended on that very place,
wide-eyed and anxious to get reacquainted with fun.
It had been long enough that I had forgotten the part where moms don’t really get vacations at all.
We still dish out snacks,
and get asked for help unknotting things,
and to Mama, Mama watch every one-legged hop and skip in the waves.
We still have to know things like where the Benadryl got put.
We still have to do the bedtime routine.
My husband was able to just disappear and lay on a forest-wrapped feather bed on a whim,
while I was busy giving lectures on sibling inclusion and calling things like “Do you understand?” down the rental house hall.
By the end of the first day I was simply seeking shreds of solitude.
A chair in the breeze.
A place to go read.
But every time I had just nestled myself,
someone appeared to sit by, or directly on top of me.
Justin and I nearly got in a fight one night as he snored three hours into a spontaneous, luxurious looking slumber.
He awoke acting startled when I came heavy-walking into the room.
“What’s the matter?” He asked,
and I answered with a look and a sigh,
“I don’t know. I guess I’m just jealous of being a DAD.”
I had longed for months for even a little baby sized escape,
and it was clear that even on vacation I’d never get one.
We moms still give out meds,
and know all the codes,
and speak to the doctors on call.
We moms don’t simply get to just GO LAY DOWN.
Dads on vacation really do seem to have it all.
For months it has been all felt dependent on me.
For months the kids are always just so…THERE.
And I love them, I do,
but every once in awhile I think Hansel and Gretel’s parents…
They were onto something exciting and new.
As May approached, all I could do was dream of summer.
A break from distance learning, and zoom calls,
and from my eight year old draping herself crying over the arm of the couch because she could not find a pen.
I, like almost every mom, had not ever expected to start homeschooling.
It was on the “Never Will I Ever” list right next to French Tip press-on toenails.
I have Jr. Highers, after all,
and everyone knows about THEM.
I had seen my daily lunch packing in all the years past as sacrifice enough.
I had already done a daily hated thing.
I remembered who doesn’t like thick cream cheese,
and who thinks tomatoes are gross,
so really, what more did they even want out of me?
But, suddenly in March, there we were.
Kids who just wanted play dates,
and me who – believe me – wanted them to be at one, too,
sitting together on the couch, trying as hard as we could to care about things like how much of a profit Troy made from selling his peaches to Sally at merely 60%.
Me trying to convince them, and myself, that things like their spelling lists even mattered anymore
while we tried, and failed, to avert our minds and our eyes from the daily news.
Then summer came, and all we cared about was if it would feel like a summer at all with closed swimming and closed social pools.
Was it really so much to ask that I get a vacation like I’d dreamed?
I wanted that other mom’s photos to be mine,
and I wanted them to be mine TODAY.
I had EARNED MY TIME
and I had WORKED TO GET HERE
and why should I have to SACRIFICE MY RIGHTS FOR THE COMMON GOOD?..,…
Oh, wait.
Because we are a family here.
In it together.
In this pandemic.
We keep giving of ourselves
BECAUSE WE SHOULD.
On the final full day my family loaded in the car after a 6am wake-up call.
To get into that beach of my dreams we needed to be there just after 7am.
We rearranged breakfast plans and grabbed a few scones to go.
Mid-way through the drive, we crested a hill to see a paradise of beauty around on every side,
and a feeling hit me that I can hardly explain.
I saw everything in that moment as there specifically just for me.
The way the sun flickered through the trees so early in the day; Golden, but still feeling cool.
The crystal clear lake.
The cars of people I love.
They’d all gotten up early to give me my dream.
“Mama, are you crying?” My eight year old, Paige, asked then,
And I was,
because at the top of that hill I could see
that that vacation was,
like my life,
really everything I had wanted it to be after all.
The journey to it was not perfect,
but the view of it sure was.
On vacation,
through trials,
in a pandemic.
Even then.
Sometimes all our sacrifices,
whether big or small,
start to be our only list.
We clench our fists, and cry our “What about me”s,
and we demand others acknowledge we exist.
But loving sacrifice is a thing that can’t help but be seen.
So many eyes are watching us.
I want to show my children that if we give love,
love is given to us;
And that,
more than any blue water,
will always be
my most ultimate dream.
This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
