Fairness

There is that moment in most of my days, when I say to myself, “is this really my life?” Sometimes it is said with joy and relief, but not this morning.


Before I was even out of bed the boys had spent an hour bickering, tattling, and yelling. Suddenly L comes into my room holding his arm and crying. “H hit me” he said. I put the bookmark in my book and got out of my ever-so-comfortable bed. H of course says, “I didn’t hit him.” After some careful questioning, I got to the bottom of what really happened. H did hit L…with piece of paper. Is this really my life?

This morning had dawned so promising too. The boys slept in until 7, but I still woke at 6:30 so I was reading until they woke. I was in my comfortable bed, in comfortable pajamas, and the day looked beautiful. Then before I knew it, it was 8 am and I wanted to run out of my life.

Are you thinking that I completely overreacted to the hitting-with-paper incident? I was so angry….angry at L for carrying-on like he was really hurt, angry at H for hitting (he does sometimes hit, so hitting with anything is a problem), and angry with myself for feeling this desire to “check out.” I was sad that this beautiful Saturday morning was already stained with yelling, fighting, and tears. Where are those lovely Saturday mornings? The ones where the children wake slowly and in good moods, and moms are woken by the sounds of their children’s laughter and not alarm clocks or fighting? When families eat breakfast together and spend the day enjoying each others’ company?

Once when L was a baby, a friend of mine said, “you are a mom, but you are not a parent until you have two.” Oh, yes, I was irritated. How dare she say that my job is easier than hers! Now I’ve come to see what she meant. The words she used aren’t exactly right, but I can’t think of a better way to say it. Settling arguments is the biggest and most challenging part of my job. Arguments that on the surface may seem silly, but boiled down they are arguments about fairness. Aren’t they all? Fairness is a big deal, and not just to children either. Fairness is absolutely overwhelming.

I didn’t run out of my life, but I did run out of the house. I sat on the front porch until I realized that I had stopped thinking about how angry I was, and was thinking about landscaping instead. 5 minutes had passed, maybe 7, enough that I was ready to talk and not yell at the boys.

The day has gotten better of course. We’ve laughed, played and had lunch together. I’ve still facilitated cease-fires, surrenders, and time outs. There is fairness in that for me, because every parent is doing the exact same thing on this Saturday. Some are handling it better than I, and some worse.

Tomorrow I will at some point ask myself, “Is this really my life?” and no matter my mood, tomorrow the answer will be the same as it was today. Yes, Mary, this is your life….how will you use it today?