Daily Creations

Every morning, my daughter wakes me
too early
and I feed her the breast milk
I have worked all night
to make in my sleep.
I go back to bed
when she allows it
or I rise.
On some mornings,
I make up my face.
On most mornings,
I do not.

I make coffee.
I make breakfast.
If it is one of those days,
I go to work for a few hours
and make a little money.
If it is one of the other days,
I stay home
and play games
I’ve created for my children.

I invent stories,
sometimes for others,
sometimes just for me,
sometimes for my children.
I tell my little boy where the airplane is going
or how the garbage truck works
or why the UPS man might have been laughing
all alone in his truck.

I build characters.
I conjure up ideas.
I formulate opinions
and if someone is there to listen
I make them known.

I make decisions:
what to wear,
where to go,
how to dress my babies,
when to change their diapers,
who to see,
how much to pay,
why,
and why not.

I make lunch:
peanut butter and jelly
and grilled cheese
and spaghetti
and tuna salad
and chicken nuggets.
I make vegetables
but nobody eats them.

I make a mess.

I make plans:
for meals,
vacations,
holidays,
chores, and
birthday parties.
I make long-term budgets
and devise complex, dynamic strategies
that juggle logistics
until I can simply spend some time
alone
in the bathroom.

I make waste.

I make an effort
to be a good person,
to be a good mother,
to be a good friend,
to be a good partner,
to be a good role model.
I make an effort
to stay alive,
to stay in control,
to stay married,
to stay happy and
healthy and sane.
I make a great effort
to continue seeing the glass as half full.

On a good day,
I make my children laugh
or my husband laugh
or myself laugh.
On a bad day,
I make mistakes,
I make excuses,
I make an ass of myself.
I make apologies
and then I try
to make amends.

I generate emotions,
more than I ever could have imagined,
and I use them with the fluids in my body
to make tears that pour down my face.

And then I craft the illusion
that I have it together,
that we are always all right.

Sometimes,
and only sometimes,
I imagine running away.
I visualize it.
I make my own reality.
I construct,
I deconstruct,
I reconstruct
our world.

And we are all right.

____________

(This entry is in response to this week's Mama Says Om Theme: Create.)

(UPDATE: This was published in the May 2006 (Motherhood) issue of ParentWise Austin.)