by Katherine Barrington

Created on: January 19, 2009

Motherhood is Calling

Tap-tap-tap sound the keys on my keyboard.

Another word, another sentence, another chapter, another draft.

A mother's job is never done, or so I'm told. I can see myself ten years from now, up to my ears in laundry and school projects. Detergent soaking into my pants, peanut butter crusting my fingers, I will try to laugh at the addition of Elmer's glue to my quickly-graying hair. Each one of my children will come to me with a gaping mouth and grimy hands, wanting, needing more, more, more. Sometimes I'll feel like screaming and other times I'll feel like crying. Somehow, however, I will have to find peace. I will retreat, seek solace somewhere I can clear my mind and drop all of the balls I have been juggling nonstop. During those moments of silence I imagine myself regaining my composure, preparing myself to reenter the battlefield of motherhood. Armed with love, experience, and a can of Lysol, I'll go back into that kitchen and do the things required of me, hopefully with some sense of pleasure.

I begin to write, never really knowing where my words will take me.

They lead, and I follow, on a journey into and beyond my imagination.

Of course, I've never actually been a mother; I can only imagine what it's like. I'd argue, though, that no woman really knows what it's like to be a parent until she becomes one. Even after reading all of the baby books in existence anyone would still be scared to death the first time their child gets a fever or falls off the monkey bars. Parenting, at least good parenting, isn't necessarily something to be planned or taught. It's something that must be learned along the way; there's just no other way to do it. Most things in life are like that, I think. The people who first set out to climb Mt. Everest might have known how far it was to the top, but I'll bet they didn't really know how far it was. They'd be huddled in their base camp tents wondering what they'd gotten themselves into. I imagine, though, that after the first day of climbing they would start to get a feel for it. Maybe feel isn't the right word since some of them probably went numb with the cold, but they made it through. Whether or not they made it to the top didn't really matter, what mattered was that they did the best they possibly could and didn't let the snows and the winds hold them back.

My fingers glide over the keys making hops, skips, and jumps in a disorganized manner.

Yet, somehow all of the keystrokes, words, and sentences come together

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