The Sometimes Mom

Sometimes I feed my son organic fruit smoothies that I make lovingly in my blender; sometimes he eats Honey Nut Cheerios that are stuck to my unwashed floor.

Sometimes I wake up before my son, shower and get dressed in something other than sweatpants, looking halfway respectable in case I leave the confines of my house; sometimes I opt for elastic waist pants, use deodorant in lieu of a shower and cancel any plans that require me to walk past the front porch.

Sometimes I get down on the floor and assemble block towers and read books and sing “The Itsy Bitsy Spider”; sometimes I can’t be bothered because I’m just so bored with entertaining a baby for 10 hours a day.

Sometimes I hustle upstairs and grab my son from his crib the minute I hear him stirring from his nap; sometimes I just want three more minutes of peace, so I let him wait it out while I sit at the kitchen table doing absolutely nothing.

Sometimes when my husband comes home after work, the dishwasher and sink are empty, the floor is vacuumed and dinner is being prepped; sometimes the sink and dishwasher are overflowing to Leaning Tower proportions, the floor is covered in crushed-up Goldfish and I beg him to please order takeout, despite it not being in the budget, so I don’t have to cook one more damned meal this week.

Sometimes I put my phone away and focus my attention completely on my son; sometimes I get caught up reading articles about being a good mom while I ignore my child altogether.

Sometimes I put my son down for a nap and I’m scarily productive: blog posts written, dishes washed, laundry folded; sometimes I haul my son into bed with me and we nap for a blissfully unproductive two hours, waking up to a pile of unfinished to-dos.

Sometimes I don’t give a damn what every other mom is doing because I’m confident in my own brand of motherhood; sometimes I can’t help but compare my thighs to the ones on the skinnier mom in the checkout line or get jealous over the family vacation to Jamaica another mom can afford that we cannot.

Sometimes I feel beyond lucky that I get to stay home with my son every day; sometimes I wish someone needed me for anything more pressing than cutting their food into tiny, bite-sized pieces or unearthing a block that’s stuck under the coffee table.

I am a mother of contradictions; at any given moment, I am a different mother to my son than I was just moments before. I am flawed and inconsistent, capable and inept, a million different colors splashed on the same canvas.

But, even in my moments of ineptitude, of laziness, of just plain not-getting-it-right, I am always a good mother. And so are you. Even if your kid eats red dye #40 and you find a Facebook conversation about Ryan Gosling more interesting than your baby and you lose your temper because someone walked in on you in the bathroom for the 10th time today. Even then, you’re still a good mom; you’re just not a perfect one.

But everyone gets it perfectly right. Sometimes.

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