When my husband and I were living the good life in Brooklyn Heights, in my our two-floor loft ( don’t get excited it was only about 750 square foot and had a leaking roof that we could never quite fix no matter how many handy men took at stab at it) Sundays were spent lazily reading the New York Times, gardening on our deck, perusing estate sales, biking over the Brooklyn Bridge to Battery Park City and of course lavishing every last bit of love on our little Shih Tzu. The mere thought of kids and how we could possibly work them into our carefully crafted activities line-up were a distant far off future consideration.
11 years and two kids later our Sundays are a far cry from those shiny, fresh off wedded bliss ones. It’s little league for my son who being the skinny kid he is- I’m surprised his glove does not weigh him down-and my daughter who begrudgingly has taken her spot on the field with a bit of a sour-puss look on her face. And after two hours in the sun, it’s off to a kid-centric butter cream fueled birthday party, play date or something that likely does not involve antiquing or brunch topped off with that sweet nectar of the gods, a mimosa.
I’ll be honest there have been Sundays when the sheen on this parenting thing begins to wear thin. It’s usually when my son, who is convinced I’m a horse and wants a piggy back ride at 6:30 am , or when my nine-year-old daughter starts to complain that she’s not in the mood to do anything and thinks she’s old enough stay home by herself (um and spend hours on her computer- I think NOT) that I yearn for those kid-free Sundays when the most critical question of the day was do we have enough champagne for all the mimosas I’d like to consume?
And yet this past Sunday, sitting in the sun, watching from the sidelines as my little five year-old bruiser took his turn up at bat ( and to my complete and utter shock he did not fall over holding said aluminum bat) and my daughter grimaced at me when I tried to get a picture of her running the bases ( and then BLAMED me when she got called out ) antiquing and gardening on a rooftop deck paled in comparison.
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