Breeders First

Motherhood.

I don't even like the sound of it.

I hear it and my head is instantly full of smarmy, soft-filtered visions of beatific women smiling like the Mona Lisa, gently cradling the heads of their peacefully sleeping infants - all blissful themselves. It's matronly. It's cloying. It's domesticated.

It's a LIE.



"Motherhood is the toughest job you'll ever love."

More bullshit.

If motherhood were a job, we'd be paid. Or, at the very least, we could put it on our resumes, and people wouldn't wet themselves laughing before herding us, ever-so-gently, out of their offices, nodding meaningfully at Security to make sure we leave the building. We'd be insured. We'd have a union. We'd get DAYS OFF.

(I know, I'm deranged. Where would we find time to form a Union?)

But this what I thought, before I was a mother.

This "job", I thought to myself - newly pregnant and full of self-satisfaction at my cleverness for being so aware, dontcha know - this "job" that I am about to sign on for, will be so meaningful (can you hear the earnest whine in my voice, even when I say it in my head?) that no matter how unglamorous, how difficult, how arduous the task - it will be a pleasure to do. Always. NO MATTER WHAT. The Zen of Motherhood. Motherhood is next to godliness. Heck, Motherhood IS godliness: I am becoming the Goddess, who birthed the world and suckles it nightly on the milk of moonlight and feeds it daily on slices of sunshine. I am Mother, hear me roar! And my children are living proof of the glory of all creation.

Um... yeah. (We'll talk later about the danger of hormones when mixed with a human brain, but suffice it to say, anything you think about your impending motherhood while actually pregnant for the first time should be viewed with deepest suspicion, at best. Preferably, it should be written down, saved, and taken out sometime around your baby's first birthday to be read to other mothers who will point, laugh, and pat you condescendingly on the head, right before they take a group nap.)


So, 3 children later, here's the real truth about motherhood: The devil wears pink pajamas.

The devil wears pink footies, and thinks it's hilarious when Mommy can't stop the baby from pulling the cable box off the TV onto his head.

The devil does not, as advertised in commercials or on sitcoms, flush pets or valuable jewelry down the toilet. She DOES, however, unroll all the toilet paper - but only on new rolls. She also locks herself in the bathroom and shreds the toilet paper. And she hides the toilet paper in the bathtub, and figures out how to turn on the taps... but not how to close the drain. The devil thinks watching tubs full of swirling clots of shredded toilet paper overflow is the very pinnacle of jocularity.


The devil, apparently, has a real problem with toilet paper.


The devil can tell you her diaper needs changing - but only after she manages to unhook one of the velcro tabs (through her clothing, mind you), allowing the diaper, and all its glorious contents, to slide gracefully to her ankle, where it will remain, hidden and ready to disgorge, until you attempt to find it by laying the devil on the couch or bed and beginning to undress her by lifting her legs, at which point you will get a nasty surprise. The devil thinks this rivals toilet paper and floods in comedic content.

The devil has siblings.

Sometimes, the devil IS the sibling.

Now, I'm not saying I don't love my children. I do. I would gleefully bite the throat out of someone merely thinking about hinting that someday they might threaten to contemplate doing them harm, and I would walk away grinning when I was done, humming the theme from "Max & Ruby".

But a little perspective is in order.

My children, my precious angels, my godsends, my perfect cherubs - those little ratfink maniac bastards who steal my sleep, spill on my furniture, and have an outright vendetta against family heirlooms and delicate tchotchkes - are not all I am. They do not define me in my entirety. They have not completely undermined my intellect (yet). And they are not perfect. They never sleep when I want them to, and certainly never all at once. They whine, usually in public, and espcially when I need them to be quiet. They engage in unseemly biological processes at heinously inconvenient times. They often refuse food with a vehemence that suggests I am trying AGAIN, and quite transparently, to poison them, even though they ate the same exact thing the day before at their own request. And they do it all with a level of mirth that can only mean they are evil (EEEeeeeebil!). They are possessed of a wily cunning and an appreciation of the finer points of humiliation. They are, in short, naughty.

But damn, they're cute.

And so, I welcome you to my blog. Someday, it wants to grow up to be a book, and have shelf space of its very own, next to my collection of pregnancy guides and other fiction. Until then, it will simply have to be content with being dedicated to the noble pursuit of happiness through the judicious application of scathing honesty to that thing we call "motherhood", and those other things we call "kids".

Shoes off at the door, yes you can have a snack, and don't say I didn't warn you!