More Mommyfesto

It's been two years since mommyfesto has published a post.  A lot has changed. Actually, it's mostly the same, only the cast of characters has aged (by two years). If you were keeping track, that means toddlerfesto is now a kindergartner (clearly in need of a new alias), that sweet six-year-old is now a full-scale boy, and we are delighted  to have a tweenfesto in the ensemble as well.

That is good news for some of us: no one is wetting their pants (at least in most situations) and some people can cut their own meat (sort of). And it's not-so-good news for others of us: I have gone from the mother of three small children (oh, how overworked she is! oh, how hectic her life is! oh, how sweet and adorable they all are!) to the mother of three school-aged children. The public's unending sympathy for me has expired. Unshowered and stained is no longer socially acceptable. I am completely expected to have my shit together, as in washed-and-ironed, organized-and-well-rested-together.

And I don't. Well not completely anyway. But I have gotten a little bit better at hiding it or at least not openly flaunting it. For example, I now know that if you stay in your workout clothes all day long, no one is quite sure when you actually worked out (thus bypassing that whole well-groomed standard) and all the other mothers in your cohort are under the paranoid impression that you have done something more than they have. It's tricky, but a time-saver.

The original mommyfesto was conceived as an anti-manifesto to motherhood. A full-scale admission that I have no business (outside of  11.5 years of hands-on experience) parading as an expert in anything mommy-related. Moremommyfesto works under the same premise, the only difference is that the topic of concern has changed from the often mind-numbing and mostly frustrating reality of parenting "small" children to the completely mind-boggling and still frustrating work of parenting more medium-size people: people that can't simply be tucked into bed and turned off; people that ask really hard questions (and don't necessarily listen to the answers, which is fine because I really didn't have a worthwhile one anyway);  people who are squarely in the oh-shit-I-could-really-fuck-you-up-for-the-rest-of-your-life-with-one-false-move phase of their lives.

That's a tough spot to be in, although not exactly unexpected. I can promise that while I take it very seriously, I'd prefer to record all the mishaps and challenges and pleasant surprises (they do happen) here rather than burying myself in expert advice on how to manage these years.  Afterall, when my children enter adulthood in the aftermath of that one false move at least they'll have this blog to show the therapist.