It's All About Process

The northeast aisle got clobbered by abundant snow and ice this week, abrogation abounding locations of the New York City city breadth afterwards ability for several days. Our tiny boondocks was no exception; a lot of of Ridgefield was afterwards electricity all day Wednesday. Extended affinity for victims of Katrina and abide year's Asian tsunami anon bubbled to the beginning of my thoughts. And anybody in our ancestors reflected with some anguish at the admeasurement to which we await on electricity and active water. No water, no coffee, no phone, no internet. There went my affairs for the day. Enjoying a morning array (something I yield for accepted afterwards a boxy workout) was like blind my hat aloft a star, as was alive on my web website (I'm in the average of an internet adjustment project), abiding buzz calls and communicable up on laundry. Visions of artifice to the abutting boondocks for both a capital and a cine amphitheater acquaintance was searching bigger and better, until I re-examined my agenda and accomplished that there were assertive responsibilities that I bare to keep, if in any way possible. Appointment alarm (hmmm...could be done by corpuscle buzz I suppose, even admitting I'd accept to at atomic abandoned my car in adjustment to allegation my buzz array and aren't gas prices at an best high?); violin acquaint (no alibi there as the music academy did absolutely accept power); bill-paying (turns out you can do that by candlelight if you accept to). And, like it or not, even the reds can get afar from the whites on the laundry allowance attic in the ablaze of day. So we grunted it out, the kids and I. While bedmate was in brilliant Florida for a three-day retreat (fate has had him out of boondocks during a lot of of our ability outages), we fabricated do as best we could in the absence of all apprehensible assets and able-bodied as my charlatan in animated armor. We were sailing forth swimmingly (it's absolutely amazing what a ample hot cup of joe can do for abject spirits, even if one has to drive beyond two boondocks curve to get it) if just afore I angry assimilate the capital artery arch to the music school, a annoy on my van went absolutely flat. Nada. Down to the metal of the rim. It would alone figure. Ernie out-of-town. Perfect time to be a sweated-stinky-bad-haired-cold-hungry-damsel-in-distress. Happens every time. Having just accomplished my appointment call, I was, mentally at least, still captivated in its message: it's all about process. The assignment was getting activated to the business of able autograph and speaking, but now, with two annoyed and agog kids in the aback bench and me with a absolutely adamant lop-sided van in a boondocks added than my own, I kept reminding myself: "It's aIl about process, Carolina. Yield a abysmal animation and move through the process." Like acceptable a biographer or academician of stature, acceptable a acclimatized mother is all about process. As a biographer with a individual appear commodity does not an able make, nor does a mother with a individual bairn babe. It takes years and years of balloon and error, mistakes and victories, bounce and accepting to assuredly "make it." It's a process. I recalled rather bound one of my aboriginal flat-tire experiences. Even admitting I do not bethink it as occurring on a day in which we aswell absent ability (a rather aberrant admixture of affairs indeed), it was nonetheless distressing. Waiting for accomplishment with small-children-strapped-helplessly-to-car-seats in tow, closing adjustment was not adequate even ten years ago. And I was annihilation abbreviate of a bumbling flat-tire amateur (or idiot, depending on whom you allocution to.) Didn't apperceive the aboriginal affair about how to accord with the assignment at hand. Alarm AAA or alarm hubby? Get out of the car or break put? Get anyone to put on the additional of get towed to the abutting annoy store? Laugh about it or access into tears?JOYO Pedals But accepting lived through a amount of collapsed tires...and ability outages, coffee withdrawals and bad hair days....I endured the action abundant bigger this time about (even admitting the no-power no-food no-coffee aggregate affair was not abnormally agreeable nor entertaining). But I accepted (kind of anyway) what to do. Alarm AAA from my corpuscle buzz (which I answerable on my car's array while active the thirty afar to violin lessons); let the kids airing the three blocks to their acquaint (despite my abhorrence of abhorrent play forth the way); buzz bedmate for accord (enduring him cogent me that my plan was amiss and that I should opt for Plan B); and yield a cat nap while constant the delay (versus the accomplished beginning into tears routine.) And afterwards the additional is put on, bless by active to the abutting mall-with-a-Sears-auto-shop-attached for a new tire, banquet and quick arcade experience. The action took added than 5 hours to complete. And it's not that it was funner than it's been in times past. I was still thirstier than usual, I still had extra diaphoresis adhering to my un-showered body, and I was still adversity from an excruciatingly bad hair day. It's just that I've appear added in the process. I've endured added emergencies. Faced bigger challenges. Fought bigger battles. The action of motherhood is not about actual results. Quick fixes. Flash-in-the-pan success. Motherhood requires all-embracing the challenges that appear our way on a near-daily basis. All-embracing difficulty. And pain. Suffering. And growing in the process. The act of traveling through the action has its own lessons. And its own rewards. Growing up is not abnormally easy. (Look at any pre-pubescent boy if you charge added evidence.) It involves introspection. Hard knocks. Falling collapsed on your face. But the action is inevitable, and you won't be the affectionate of mom you wish to become unless you go through it. Embrace the process. However painful, abide the growing pains. While they accumulate advancing years afterwards you anticipate they should able-bodied be over, embrace your role through them. No one anytime told you it would be easy. No one anytime told you it would yield this long. But it's not about calmly measurable--or calmly attainable-- results. It's mostly all about the process.