Julie Samrick
Kid Focused
Dear Tracy,
I am sorry I can't make your bachelorette party later this month. I would like nothing better than to kick up my heels with you, dance, and celebrate the next wonderful chapter of your life. But you see, it's May.
It was the writer T.S. Eliot who called April "the cruelest month," but he obviously didn't have kids.
Despite its short and cute name, the most petite and innocent sounding name of all the months, May, is the perfect storm of craziness, when all activities come slamming together at a crowded intersection. I would love to end May with you and enjoy your last days as a single woman, but I'm afraid that by the end of the month, I will probably be eating chocolate under the covers in a very dark room.
Maybe I shouldn't be telling you this. Ignorance is bliss, right?
By the way, I hope your honeymoon is somewhere wonderful and relaxing, and that you can spend at least a week there (but wouldn't two weeks away really be something?).
We've got two little league teams in full swing. That's four games a week. There is also an entire Saturday devoted to Little League Day in May. Swim team just started, and though we have a one-sport-at-a-time policy in the Samrick house, they overlap for several weeks. We're at the pool three days each of those weeks. The first swim meet and one of the last baseball games fall on the same day. You can try to plan and be strict about keeping free time for the family, but somehow the calendar still fills up in May.
Will there be swimming during your bachelorette party weekend? I'll be with you in spirit, or maybe I'll jump in the pool at swim practice in your honor and start a trend with all the other moms, who I know secretly want to cannonball into the pool with me (if only we could).
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Before then, as school gets out just before the month's end, there is a marathon of reports to help with, last-minute dashes to Michael's, Teacher Appreciation Week, Open House, baking, Pioneer Day, end-of-the-year parties, concluding catechism classes, graduations, field trips, a First Communion to attend, and a quick jaunt up to Pollock Pines for the county Spelling Bee.
Around the house we're contending with warm weather dress code debates, late to bed and even earlier to risers, piano recital practice, allergies, a fear of male swim coaches, and a battle with mosquitoes (which I've recently learned hatch, and are at their pinnacle in May).
There are date nights to put off until June, and bunko, leisure reading and haircuts to fit in. But I would gladly give up any of those anyway if I could spend the weekend with you.
May is indeed the cruelest month for moms. Thank goodness it also includes Mother's Day (I wonder, is that a coincidence?).
Don't get me wrong. Motherhood is wonderful. You will never feel more needed or purposeful. Just beware when May rolls around!
Until then, know that I will be the first to wish you well at your wedding... in July.
Love,
Julie
This article originally ran in May of 2011, but is just as applicable (if not more so) today.
Julie Samrick is a stay-at-home mom of four young kids and the founder of Kid Focused, a site devoted to children and family issues. Subscribe to the free Kid Focused newsletter delivered weekly to your inbox and connect with us on Facebook too. Permission granted for use on DrLaura.com.
