Orble - Those are not my kids!

Those are not my kids!

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On God and not having babies

January 23rd 2008 02:49

Sometimes I look at your boys and all I see is their mother.

I see the child that I am.

I see myself, without children.

I never really wanted children. But then I met you. My little soul melted into you and wanted to bond with yours. Deeply.

If I never have children, will I always be a child? Will I wither and feel empty? Or will I flourish and remain strong, not sapped by another life?

You told me to pray, and I wish I could.
I wish I had a god to answer all these questions.

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Soccer and Sunburn

January 23rd 2008 02:32

My house is full of sunburnt boy limbs. Little bodies, bowling in to pee while I’m in the shower. Unapologetic and unashamed. Forcing me to get real.

They spread themselves in colourful disarray across my floor as they play lego and pokemon. They flap their willies around as they do their “morning exercises” – some kind of exuberant, glad-to-be-alive way of learning about bodies, and what it means to be a boy.

We arrive to pick them up from their mother’s. They clamber over me, planting a sloppy kiss on my cheek and accidentally jamming a sneakered foot in my crotch. I sit in the dark of the car and watch my partner and his ex wife discusses plans for soccer, framed by the light of the doorway.

“Dad”, Boy1 asks at dinner “why are your girlfriends always so much younger than you? I can feel my neck get hot, but you answer smoothly “because I’m a very lucky man”. Girlfriends? Always younger? How many of us have there been? How many women have these kids seen come and go?

These children will never be mine.

I will always be your child.

We take them to soccer the next day and watch Boy2 play. A tiny, fuzzy little heartbeat of a being, zig-zagging away out on the soccer field. Buzzing around in an oversized, green and white, candy striped jersey and socks up to his knees.

You stand on the sideline, shoulders hot from the sun, yelling encouragement as Boy. runs so enthusiastically in the wrong direction.

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I am not a mother

January 23rd 2008 02:00

I am not a mother.

I have no idea how to be a mother. I am a woman, trying to negotiate the terrifying complexities of loving a man who comes gift wrapped with two pre-teen boys.
I can’t decide if I am lost at sea, or coming in to harbour.

I am often bewildered and unsure. I don’t know when to insist that vegetables get eaten for example, or that chocolate ice cream does not count as dinner.

I don’t know when to console, and when to ignore the dramatics.

I don’t know how much sexuality to show in front of small curious eyes.

I like my own space. I like the quiet.

I don’t know how to answer the constant barrage of questions like “what are we going to do now?” “what’s for dinner?” and “are we there yet”?

I have no idea what to say to the statement that “my mum is the best cook in the world” as I am preparing dinner (the kid doesn’t know that there is already a cyclonic mass of emotions in my gut about his heart-breakingly beautiful mother).

We go to the beach and I don’t think to remind about jumpers and hats and peeing before we leave the house.

I didn’t bring the sunscreen, or fill up any water bottles, and I just want to sit for a while and watch the water, I don’t want to wrestle or play footy.

This is all strange to me. Especially as I grew up in a houseful of girls. But I’m growing to love the tumbling, curling warmth of these foreign little creatures. The way they lean in for hugs and then frisk away. The impish grins and the constant vivacity. The way they go all soft when they’re tired, melting into their Dad as he carries them out to the car.