Rhapsody on a Diet Coke

I was in between activities the other afternoon, which is the usual these days. I had dropped Aidy off at soccer practice on the wide, green fields behind the middle school and done a quick round of grocery shopping (J says I need to be more efficient in my shopping, a particular brand of advice giving - that is, providing advice about household chores that you, yourself, do not do - we will discuss on another day).

I had decided somewhere during that frantic grocery spree that I would buy myself a Diet Coke, which is a treat - if you can call it such a thing - I enjoy once or twice a month. No judgment here, no reason. It just happens to be true. Every once in awhile I want that particular taste, caffeine content and level of carbonation. I like the cans better than the bottles, and I like the fountain version at a fast food place best of all. It hits the spot, as they say, and it hits the spot infrequently enough that when the urge appears, I succumb without question.

But I forgot to get the Diet Coke at the store and I was cursing myself because there were only about 7 minutes until I needed to be back at the field to pick up Aidy. If I didn’t have it I’d be fine, obviously, but if I did have it I’d be fantastic.

I don’t know if this is going to resonate with anyone, or, instead, make me sound insane, but every once in a clear blue while, I remember that I am an adult with the power to make my own decisions. Every once in awhile, as I’m navigating in cruise control through these busy days, I remember that I could, in fact, take 5 minutes to sit and think about what I should do next. That I am not beholden to this often-happy madness but, in more respects than not, its master. There are non-negotiables, sure. Like, it’s best to pick up your daughter from soccer practice. It’s best to go to work and to manage your finances. But there are choices within these frameworks, too. Major choices about career and actives, about who you spend your time with and when you need help.

Minor choices about what you should do with the now only 6 minutes until you pick up your daughter that, perhaps, speak to larger issues about how you take care of yourself.

I turned left into the convenience store at a gas station on my way to the soccer field where I quickly found a plastic bottle of Diet Coke (no cans). When I brought it up to the counter, the man working there began asking me about my day. Had anything fun happened? How many children did I have? I was surprised at the small talk. I was delighted. Plenty of fun things had happened, including this impromptu conversation and the anticipation of what was just ahead.

We told one another to have a good night. I opened the bottle as soon as I got in the car and was off, a minute late but a million times better.

April, 2023

When my children were very little, I used to take the long way home from dinners out with friends, postponing the inevitable return to whatever awaited me. I wasn’t an unhappy mom - far from it - but children are sometimes possessed by a particular neediness in those early years and I sought out a sense of personal separation: I was someone before these babies arrived and I’d find her again.

As it all does, this part of my life passed. This passing is a lesson that doesn’t lend itself well to mere explanation, and therefore nearly impossible to impart to other parents without their going through it. Phases don’t feel like phases when you’ve never experienced them before.

I’ve documented these feelings plentifully in my writing; more than enough, you might argue (or insist!) My point in bringing them up here is to compare these feelings with the current feelings I’m experiencing, which I was telling a friend about recently: where I know the goal is to give our children the tools to be independent operators in this big world…to take wings and depart. But what if my children stayed here, walking to and from the local school every day and we watched movies in bed every night? What if we embrace this goal, instead?

Even as I type these words, I know I don’t really mean them. Of course I want my children to grow up and succeed and I actually want to watch “Succession” with J tonight, and not a family-appropriate movie. And yet, I feel like I have to give these feelings words, just like I gave all those other feelings their space in early parenthood.

Our days now are marked by the signs of individuals fully participating in the world without our assistance. Of note (accidental pun, I’m leaving it) is Gabe’s obsession with the piano. He’s been taking lessons for a couple years, and the musical process — practice, achieve, perfect — has filled a gaping hole in his life, one he used to attack with a persistent “What can I do?” uttered to J and I upon waking (and he wakes up early!) over, and over, and over, our answers never satisfactory, never up to his standards. He wanted to do something like construct a full-sized village in the backyard out of sticks and found recyclables, complete with codes of governance, nine participating and equally committed friends, a glue gun and a lathe. Could we buy a lathe?

We wanted him to draw. Or maybe watch a show.

The piano, however, has been a godsend. He took to it quickly, and unlike Nora (sorry Nora, but it’s true) practiced daily because he wanted to; I never once had to ask, which, those of you who have instrument-playing children will understand, is a real gift. In fact, I sometimes have to ask him to stop playing, as he likes to play loud and early in the morning, working the same song over and over, and then, once he’s mastered it, playing it really fast. Fast, loud, piano-playing is not ideal when I’m calling up the stairs to ask Aidy if she’s ready for school yet, or on the weekend when we are trying to ease into the morning.

You might say to me: “Cara, why don’t you and J simply not allow him to play in the early morning?” And I get that, but I cannot express to you how much of an improvement the piano is over the era of “What can I do?” which could, in its most persistent forms, ruin our days. And you might say to me: “OMG, why did you allow him to ruin days with that annoying question? Why not ignore him?” And what I am here to tell you is: that is not how Gabe works.

So, we let him play. When it is not too loud, or fast, or I am not trying to speak over it to get another family member’s attention about something like where a Chromebook charger is, I love it.

In recent months, Gabe has been picking out music on his own with a particular interest in ragtime. We bought him a Scott Joplin book, he’s working on multiple pieces and his piano teacher has been an enthusiastic supporter. Gabe also likes to play Scott Joplin in the car while we are driving to and from various activities. He insists that he be allowed to do so, pointing out that Nora has played Taylor Swift on nearly every car ride, everywhere, forever, and it is his turn.

If you want to know what my life feels like these days, get in the car, put on “Pine Apple Rag” and head somewhere that is ten minutes away, but you need to be there in two.

My life is now like that. Marked by car rides that require my getting somewhere on time because my children have places to be, interests that dictate our schedule. Set to music that I didn’t introduce to them, but vice versa.

I don’t take the long way home anymore. I am sometimes the needy one now. “You are so good at this,” I tell my once-restless middle child, trying to ruffle his hair while he sits at the piano bench; he wriggles away, but I don’t think he hates it.

There are these sparrows that are nesting behind the shutters outside our bedroom window. They alight loudly, alarmingly, on the screen throughout the day, chirping demands to their spouse. The angle of the nest is such that we can’t see the babies, but we can hear them, and they, too, are loud and fast and aren’t remotely concerned about staying quiet in the early morning.

It’s too easy, this comparison. So unbearably on the nose. Still, I can’t help but think about that bird family and how well they exemplify the business of parenting. The goal - quite literally - for the children to take flight. I, of course, have no idea what the adults are saying to one another all day. It is, undoubtedly, pragmatic. But I like to imagine there is wistfulness, too. They speak, after all, in a song.