I’m a waffler. It annoys the hell out of me, my husband (Mr.Mary Tyler Mom) and no doubt, someday it will annoy my son, too (Mary Tyler Son). But as Donald Rumsfeld says, It is what it is. I waffle. Don’t confuse that with cooking waffles. I don’t cook waffles. I simply waffle.
In December 2010 I went back to my professional career after a four year hiatus spent caring and grieving for my first born child, a beautiful girl named Donna. Donna died eighteen months ago, but who’s counting? Technically, seventeen months and twenty days, but that’s only if you’re counting. Sigh. During Donna’s illness and our grief, Mr. Mary Tyler Mom and I started an online journal to help us stay connected to the folks that matter to us. It kind of became it’s own thing and made the hell that is pediatric cancer accessible to many a folk. When Donna died, we still wrote, just less. Then Mr. Mary Tyler Mom stopped, but I kept writing. It helped and was a lot cheaper than therapy. The irony that I used to be a hospice grief counself is thick, folks. Thick.
That said, the time came where I missed my old working self – – that hopeful, optimistic young thing who used to idealize Mary Tyler Moore. That young gal who was going to change the world, one person at a time. Sigh. Yeah. I’m older now. Grayer. Grieving. I no longer think Imma change the world one person at a time. Nah. I’m pretty happy just doing my own thing, taking care of Mary Tyler Son, knowing intimately that childhood is freaking (I promised my Dad I wouldn’t swear anymore) fleeting. So I went back to work. And started Mary Tyler Mom. Donna’s illness did bring me the gift of writing. I love it and it helps. Mary Tyler Moore is my patron saint of hope, and yeah, I’m older and married and my legs aren’t nearly as good as hers, but damn if my kids aren’t cuter.
But what about the waffles? Oh, yeah. So I started Mary Tyler Mom in January and then a friend suggested I pitch it to ChicagoNow and I did and they liked it. Cool. But that meant moving on up to the Big City, to the big deluxe apartment in the sky. Here is where the waffling begins. I’m protective of Mary Tyler Mom. And I hate change. Change can suck it (is that swearing?). Do I move? Do I open myself up to you all? Blah, blah, blah, whine, whine, whine. I’m telling you I’m boring. Waffling is boring. It took me two freaking months of a daily diet of waffles to get here. But I’m here.
What’s my point? I don’t know. Other than anything worthwhile takes work. And time. Like my job. I now work in a non-profit corporate environment. And just now, three + months in, I’m starting to feel at home. I’ve learned the codes to the copy machine and office mates now ask how my weekend was. Hard earned, people, hard earned. The grind of fixing dinner for a toddler and a husband who is never home at the same time any given night has set in. I’ll be writing about working and mothering simultaneously. I’m earnest and sarcastic and wicked funny and sometimes a downer. Consider this our introduction. Stop in, pull up your selectric and a cup of coffee and let’s chat. Talk to Mary Tyler Mom.
