There are two things you need to know before I post this picture.

1) It happens to be October, and so I have done a lot of recent writing about breast cancer risks and prevention. (Want to know them? Here’s what Susan G. Komen has to say.)
2) I was shopping for wine when I took this picture. Even though I was well aware that alcohol increases your risk of breast cancer. By a lot. In fact, only one drink a day is reasonable, ladies — if that. And if you have 4 or 5 drinks a day, well, your risk is up by 50%. True Story.

So, there I was, wheely-wheeling down the Target wine aisle in search of some breast cancer causing wine for a nice relaxing evening on the coach with my husband, when I spotted this…

Really? Really.

For all their apparent best intentions, these pink ribbons need to back off. Enough already. They need to be kept for things that actually DO something to prevent breast cancer. Those things that, would you believe it, raise money for research. They should not be about how much better consumers feel about the products they buy when, in real life, only $ 0.000001 of what they spent lands anywhere near any real research.

“Oh GOOD I can buy this Cuisinart because it’s PINK and helps stop breast cancer! Oh and here’s a pink spatuala! And this cereal box has a ribbon too! Good! We’re protecting breasts everywhere with MY SHOPPING!”

Um, no.

(This has all been said before, of course. It’s called “pink-washing“, but I’m saying it here, too.)

“But we’re raising awareness!”

On an enormous bottle of cheap wine? Don’t insult me. Who are we kidding. Keep your pink ribbons off my booze. I know what that wine is doing and I know it has nothing good to do with breast cancer. I KNOW BETTER. And so should all of us.

Needless to say, I did not buy THAT particular bottle of cheap wine. I bought another brand — one without any cheery health-related logos, thank you very much.

Cheers.

“the world owes me nothing
and we owe each other the world.”

This post has been sitting in my head awhile with these Ani lyrics satelliting around the unorganized mess of it all.

I have been thinking a lot about what we deserve and what we don’t. I’ve been thinking about entitlement and some assumption that we are owed something because, well, we exist, dammit. And because I breathe this abundant air and take up this comfortable space, I shall get what I need when I need it. No questions asked.

But I wonder how much of this is me just getting old and smacking my gums about “kids today.” Because “kids today” should appreciate what they have and not complain about it or expect twice as much more.

Of course, maybe it is our fault. We have created a quick-fix culture where diseases are diagnosed by Dr. Google, soothing British voices direct us where to drive until they must recalculate, and college kids can download class notes on the board with one push of a button. Yawn. Of course they can.

I don’t think life is easier, however. Not now. Not when the unemployment rate is over 9% of the population. (It was only 5% when I graduated college in 1997. True story.) I think we are up against challenges our country hasn’t experienced in decades.

Maybe that’s it. Maybe since we get so much less now, we have to fight and scrap for whatever we have. Own it before you actually do, otherwise it’s someone else’s. You snooze, you lose.

“and i wonder if everything i do
i do instead
of something i want to do more.”

And then there’s that. I wonder how often I sell myself short and hardly demand more. I own a lot of guilt and feel like I should apologize for, well, everything. And I think I am too nice. And someone just looked at me funny, so I obviously need to apologize AGAIN for something I’m not sure I even did but seeing them smile and feel better makes me feel like I didn’t “F” something up at least. (What a hero I am.)

So, maybe it’s my fault.

*guilt*

But I’m a wildly optimistic person and maybe I need to own the value in that more. If the sky is falling, I think that maybe whatever is falling out of it could be useful. And who needed it in the sky ANYWAY. Yay for falling things everywhere!

I like to be happy. It’s in my nature to be happy. NOT a grumpy, stooped over, gum smacking a-hole who wishes folks would care a whole lot less about themselves. Whatever. Really, life is so good after all. And maybe if I simply cut the guilt, get my priorities in order, and let the light shine through — there’s hope that someone else might get it together too.

“i do it for the joy it brings
because i’m a joyful girl
because the world owes me nothing
and we owe each other the world
i do it because it’s the least i can do
i do it because i learned it from you
i do it just because i want to
because I want to”

I was supposed to fly out of Boston that day. But I changed my flight to the 12th. I had a conference in Texas to get to but there was just too much oh-so-important work to get done. So, instead of boarding a plane that morning, I was speed-walking across the Northeastern University campus at just about the same time they were getting on those planes only a few miles away.

On such a bright, cloudless, calm day, with everyone milling about their work mornings, why would anyone expect terror? Going to work, going through the routine of the morning commute is something we depend on, and trust deeply — our own daily clockwork ticking by and proving that all is well. We each have a work to-do list of so much busy business. We all carry with us the office drama, what will they need of me today, will any of it ever get done. Hair still wet from the shower, lip gloss still slick, subways, the usual streams of people, walking, bags over shoulders, newspapers in hand, Dunkin Donuts, cars, buses, crossing streets, blue skies, cool, fresh breezes, the sounds of the city, the sounds of normal.

Because all of these people going about their morning commutes so calmly would not be here if it was not ok, if it was not normal. Right?

I think about the many, many people of New York City and Washington D.C. and those stepping onto early Tuesday morning commuter flights feeling the same way that day. Work. Office politics. Needing coffee. Did I put out the trash. I have to sign the kids up for soccer practice. To-do lists, their own lives, all equally important, dusting the sleep cobwebs from their minds.

A perfect, cloudless Tuesday morning could never betray this routine, this trust of normal.

I was sitting in a meeting around 8:45. We went through the agenda around a conference table with a group of managers. No one was particularly excited to be there, it was just another Tuesday morning meeting which better end soon because I had so much to do before tomorrow.

I think of how many other people were settling into meetings too. Or checking their voicemail while browsing news stories online. Or taking sips of coffee from the vendor down the hall who is just so damn nice for having been at work for three hours already…

And then it happened. Our meeting carried on. So many meetings in New York City and Washington D.C. could not. Of course, we just thought it was a small plane.

But then it wasn’t. Stunned and staring at each other. And then one hit in D.C. and I bolted from the room. My mother worked next to the White House. I knew what had happened.

Can you understand that much horror in a moment? Probably not. I fell apart while others told me to calm down. But they didn’t understand the horror, either. Still, I stayed in the office. I was too afraid to get back on the subway system that got me to work hours before, and — while I dialed my mother’s phone number over and over and over — I stared at the Prudential Center from my office window. It looked so much like one of the towers, so why not.

When I finally reached my mother, she had somehow made it home. She was in Roslyn, VA. when the plane hit the Pentagon. She saw the smoke come up. And while everyone stopped and stared, she grabbed her purse and ran, made it out of the parking lot that was locked down ten minutes later, drove over sidewalks to escape the city and made her way back to the house. If you knew her, that wouldn’t surprise you either.

And while we talked on the phone, I watched the traffic jammed up Huntington Avenue, pushing out of the city. Not one car went into the city. The only car I saw pull up there was my husband’s who came to rescue me out of the city a few hours later. We u-turned, and joined the crawl away.

I came home to an answering machine with my father’s cries. He was in east Africa. Had I taken a plane out of the city that day?? Had I??! Where was I!? The only one he reached was my sister-in-law, who was being evacuated out of her office in Disney World. Because, well, why not.

We know the horror of that day now. But then, with our hair finally dried from morning showers and work clothes still on, we all sat in shock.

What the hell was going on?

I still find it fascinating that September 12, 2001 in Boston was as normal as it was. I found myself on the same subway train into the city, sitting across from the same people I always do. Papers open, pictures of terror on the covers. None of us said a word. And I went into to work for another meeting around the same time as I had the day before. We all talked some then, but there was work to do. It was another beautiful Fall day in Boston and there was no reason not to get down to business. Our buildings were still standing, after all.

Our morning routines, our busy-work and meetings and office chit-chat meant that much.

What else was there to do? Wait? Remain vigilant? Put a flag up? Buy some duct tape? Drive to New York City? Drive as far away from New York City as possible? Never fly again? Never go into a building again? Never trust a person who looks anything like the men who got on those planes that day?

No. Normal came back because we needed it so Goddamn badly. Like a brick dropped into water rushing to the sewer, around the chaos we fell back into line. It had to be fine. I still needed a shower the next day and those deadlines were still looming. While first responders only a few hundred miles away were digging in rubble for men and women who had just sipped their morning coffee seconds before their death one day before, we stopped at Dunkin Donuts for a 1 cream, 2 sugars and a paper.

We needed normal then, like we need it now 10 years later. We hold on tight to what part of normal we have left — the part that was not reduced to rubble that day — while we wait for what’s next.

I spend a lot of time worrying whether or not I’ve become THAT mom.

You know the mom I’m talking about.

The mom who emails her child’s teacher one week into school to reeeally explain the hell out of her son. Just in case his teacher can’t figure it out for herself. That mom would imply her child’s brilliance with about as much subtlety as a jackhammer and would make her email so long and self-indulgent that this very kind teacher (so kind it makes me giddy, I think she’s so so great for him) would admit at Open House that she hadn’t had time to finish said email. Because that mom WOULD email her the night before Open House, expecting her full attention in some immediate gushing response back.

I worry I’m that mom who asks too many questions and clips too many boxtops with some pathetic hope of winning over the school’s approval and sits hopefully at her son’s desk waiting for whatever experience he’s been having everyday to soak into her subconscious via osmosis while her kids keep their distance for fear of being associated with the crazy lady.

I worry about being the mom who isn’t enough of a squeaky wheel. Who figures the teachers know best and the boys will be fine and she doesn’t have time to stress over it and honestly cares more about getting to work on time than setting aside enough of her schedule to advocate for her kid to make sure either is getting what exactly he needs.

I worry about becoming that mom who is over-bearing and far too persistent and all “howwasyourdayhowwasyourdayhowwasyourday” with enough potential to drive her kid into muted retreat, never to tell her a fracking THING about his day at school. Ever. No matter how many times or various ways or what time of day she asks. He will not tell her.

I worry about becoming that mom who yells, “WAY TO GO HONEYBUN!!!” at a baseball game, in front of all his peers, and then glares at the father who turns around with a look back as if to say “….really?” How dare he.

I worry about becoming that mom who isn’t sure if it was a goal or a hit or a run and is more concerned about chatting with the mom next to her or checking in on Foursquare.

I worry I’m that mom who falls to pieces scheduling activities for her first child and then drags her second along and expects him to behave when we don’t have the time/energy/money/insert excuse to do something special for him that takes up just as much time in our week.

I worry I’m a mom who might explain away her child. And hover. And not let him make enough mistakes for himself. And want just so bad it makes my fingers itch to do it ALL for them (dressing them, homework, brushing their teeth, wiping their ass, ImustdoitImustdoitImustdoitbecauseIwilldoitrightAhhhh!!!).

Then again, I worry both are left to fend for themselves, without any volunteering parent to be seen for miles, from 8am – 5pm, everyday. (Who is raising my child right now because I have no idea, not really…)

I worry I’m that mom who will share her parenting ideals with any parent within earshot — as if she has solved it all and really just wants to impart her wisdom to the starving masses. How kind of I.

I worry I’m a mom without. One. F-ing. Clue.

I worry I’m that mom who just simply HAS to blog her child’s EVERY MOVE because isn’t it HYSTERICAL that he put a laundry basket on his head and pretend to be a robot. Oh em GEE, it’s just SO FUNNY so the entire world MUST see it because her child is SO BRILLIANT. And THERE I’ll put it on FACEBOOK too in case anyone missed their hilarity! You’re WELCOME, world.

I worry I’m that mom who cares more about writing about her children than actually sitting there and prying their wrestling bodies apart to resolve whatever “pound my brother to death” issue is at hand.

(Did I post it on Twitter, too? I’ll be right back, kids…)

I’m worried I’m that mom that gets overwhelmed and exhausted from parenting. And I’ve only been home with them for an hour. How dare I.

I’m worried I’m not trying hard enough. Or trying too hard. Or not that cookie-baking, take pictures of every milestone mom. Or not letting them make the cookies and take the pictures themselves.

I worry.

I worry I’m THAT mom.

(Oh and in case you don’t want to be THAT mom with your child’s teacher, read this. I keep reading it, and then adjusting my panic accordingly.

I haven’t stuck with blogging all these years because I like the sound of my own voice. On the contrary, I like people a whole lot more than yacking ceaselessly in my own plotted out space on the Internet. And people, many many people, with their own plotted space on the Internet, are actually behind all of these blogs. Blogs discussing side by side, leading to real interaction, leading to community. What you say matters, affects another, they respond, you connect, you have found someone like you and conversation and change and all kinds of crap you never expected would ever happen, HAPPENS. And you never even have to leave the house while your child naps in the other room, either.

So, knowing that community is what this blogging beast is really all about, I took my blog out of the house to meet some people behind the online connections last Saturday. I met a group of folks down at The Pub for Tampa BlogHer.

It’s an amazing thing, this blogging social media world. Because, while I had only met a few of those folks “in real life” before, I was greeted with hugs and familiarity and comfort. I know these people. We’ve known each other for years. Through this community we’ve built.

I’m excited because we’re going to really work on building up our local Tampa blogging community more. Another get-together is being planned for March. There is chatter of a Facebook page for local area bloggers — a place to keep networking, reaching out, making sure one has another’s back, maybe passing on event updates and tweet-up info. or which conferences are good or maybe some suggestions for reviews.

I love blogging. But I love people even more. I love media and words and information, but I love being social about it even more. When I can, I want to keep prioritizing the community part of this blogging beast. It’s important. It’s networking with heart. It reaches places I never expected it could.

I had a fantastic time seeing everyone that night. Tampa has a wonderful core of real and talented bloggers and writers. I can’t wait to see everyone again. But, really? I can’t wait to see what we’ll do next.

Oh wait. I forgot to talk about the men in kilts. So. There were very nice men who worked there dressed in kilts. And before I say something very double standard-ish and contrary to my usual non-objectifying tendencies… just make your way to The Pub yourself and come to your own conclusions about why I felt the need to give “men in kilts” the honor of being in the title of this blog post.

Picture courtesy of our host, Denise of @denisermt. Read her great wrap-up post here.

Others there?

Erika of Southern Fried Lives

Angel of Cheeky Sweetie

Maria of Mommy Melee

Raffi of Betty Running

Brian of Digital Running

Kirsten of Gone Bananas

Karen of If I Could Escape

Susie of Hide and Go Scrap

Clarissa at TBO

My suddenly so-much-taller eight year old started at a new school this year. For a variety of fairly practical reasons, it just made sense to switch him. So, considering he would be starting at a new school, where he knew no one at all, I assumed that he might need a little back-up. I was wrong.

After dropping his brother at his Kindergarten class (which is a whole other “How is my baby in Kindergarten??” post that I just don’t have the heart or the time for right now), my now third-grader urged both of us towards his building. He was nervous about the tardy bell (his previous school didn’t have one of those) and wanted to get into his class right away.

Finally, we stepped up to his building. He turned to me. And stopped me.

“Don’t come in, Mom.”

“Wha…? But…”

He had told me earlier he was going to go in by himself, but I’m not sure I entirely believed him. I thought he might crack, or get nervous at the last moment. Nope. He stood there. Suddenly more confident and collected than I had ever seen him. But, maybe that was my emotionally-charged parent imagination — because I can’t imagine he was really that cool about it.

I fumbled for my phone.

“Can I take a picture of you in front of the building door, at least?” He obliged. He gave me a great, almost proud smile. And then he turned, navigated himself and his back-pack around an exiting family, and… was gone.

And that’s when I lost it. Watching him walk down the hallway, while I peered through the door’s window… I couldn’t believe it. Just like that, without looking back, he was gone.

I’m so proud, how is this happening, he is doing this, what if he needs me, he doesn’t need me.

And gone.

I was in the grocery store and I heard a baby cry.

No. I didn’t start to lactate. But something did happen. And it’s something I haven’t been able to shake ever since I’ve had children and I hear a child cry. Maybe you will get what I mean, so I’ll explain. But I don’t think you ever have had to lactate to get it either, either.

So, back to this baby. She started to cry. And it was an “I’m so tired, I need a snuggle and a nap and get me out of this grocery cart” kind of cry. I couldn’t help myself, I oh-so-innocently wheelie-wheeled my cart around the corner and into her aisle… just to see how she was doing.

Her mom was harried. She had a sandwich platter in her cart and soda bottles and paper plates and a bunch of other party stuff she clearly had to get that afternoon. But her daughter wasn’t having it. She was so, so tired. Slumped to the side and crying — no, pleading, really — in a way that made any mother want to find a crib and a dark room and no stim and some sweet peace for that child.

There was nothing I could do about it. It came from somewhere deep beyond my control. My gut hurt for her. My arms ached to scoop her up, snuggle and soothe, and seek out a spot to get her cozy and quiet. My heart went out to the mom, too. I KNOW she wanted those same things for her daughter but, with something going on soon, she had to get that shopping done. My guess is that her daughter’s schedule was shot to hell after a day of errands and running here and there. Hardly anything that will hurt that girl, but my ache to comfort her was STRONG, my friends.

Kind of like lactating.

Let me back up and explain the comparison. Don’t freak, non-lactating types. This is just how it is…

You’ve heard of how women will “let down” when they hear a baby cry. And by “let down” I mean the boob flood-gates suddenly open and a teeny hose-like effect occurs in the general chest region. There is nothing you can do about it, really. It’s just this primal thing that happens when a baby cries or you know a baby is hungry. Mother nature just turns on the faucet.

Of course, this doesn’t happen to me any longer. My faucet dried up (OMG, has it been this long) about 4 years ago. But it used to. And it wasn’t pretty when I wasn’t ready for it. And that’s why God made breast pads. But I digress…

So back to the baby in Publix. She was crying and I felt this ache. Deep down. I wanted to help her. I wanted to take care of her and figure out a way to get her what she needs. It’s almost beyond reason or self-control, it’s just there, built-in, instinctual, just the way I am wired now.

This strange, deep down ache and need to help a crying child was not there before I had my own. Before I would have been all: “Aw. She’s crying… poor mom. Oh, I’m totally watching Melrose Place tonight…”

Not now. Now, I feel a physical pull, a painful ache, a lump at the back of my throat and an empathy like none other for the mom trying to cope and care and do it all.

It’s kind of like lactating. And, dried up or not, I suspect it will feel like this for as long as I’m a mother… which is pretty much forever.

My five year old fell today. According to my husband and my excited seven year (who liked to re-enact the entire scene over and over at my feet), he just tripped running out of a room, and fell. No biggee. Except that he really hurt his finger and it started to swell and he refused to curl it into a fist. So, off to the E.R. we went. A few x-rays and one new splint later, my five year old is officially the proud owner of a slightly fractured finger, right near the knuckle (hence the fancy splint).

This hasn’t been his summer. He has only recently been told he won’t have to get a skin graft on his foot after this happened on the 4th of July. And, since he’s healed so well, he may be allowed to swim this weekend for the first time since then.

(The splint can be taken off to swim. I asked.)

The burn wasn’t his only brush with danger either. The other day he came inside to calmly inform me that there was a snake under his swing. And there was. A water moccasin. I don’t know how he saw it, it looked like a tree root to me. But he did, and survived that possibility of a very serious (if not, lalalalala, I don’t like to think about it, lalalala, potentially fatal) snake bite.

It’s been a strange summer for me with him. I have been worried about him a lot. I’m not sure if it’s burn PTSD (see above), or snake fears, or preparing him for Kindergarten, or what, but I’ve had these recurring nightmares involving only him. Night after night, we lose him, or he gets kidnapped, or he is trapped at the top of a high-rise building in childcare with gun-wielding terrorists in the lobby who just cut off the power to the elevators and exploded the staircases (that was only two nights ago).

I’ve been worried about him. Really stressing out.

But, strangely enough, then this happens… and I’m totally fine about it. Completely.

Because as far as I’m concerned, as long as my child can still skip, and laugh, and sing Justin Beiber songs on the papery examining table tonight, and whine, and tell me he is “so sad” when he doesn’t get toys from stores, and hit his brother with his splint when I’m not looking, and make believe on the back porch chatting away with an old R/C car up to his ear like a phone… if he can still do all of those things, he’s fine. He’s fantastic even.

In the grand scheme of it all, THIS is nothing.

Behold the bounty of our school supply shopping escapades.

And this doesn’t include the pile of clothes and underpants that we bought either.

It was a tax-free weekend for school supplies here in Florida. And, since school starts in two weeks, we figured we would take advantage.

But even after so very much money spent (tax-free = throngs of shoppers out and about = price inflation, just saying), somehow it doesn’t seem like enough.

It seems so ironic, you know? A tax-free holiday offered to residents to get geared up for a year ahead at public schools that are barely intact after our governor decided to cut more than $2 billion dollars from education. Why? He doesn’t want to — GOD FORBID — raise taxes. Schools in Florida will have $700 less per student than they did before. Because, you know, their cups were just running over with spending surplus in years prior…

Ask a Florida teacher how much he or she made last year. Ask a Florida teacher how much he or she makes this year.

The education cups have never run over here. Never. And the only reason we have teachers still teaching at our schools is, well, because they don’t have much of a choice but to take the cut. Or, they are just awesome men and women who care too much about their kids to bail out and try for something else. Or maybe they aren’t teaching at all anymore, because they were fired due to these “tax-saving” budget cuts.

I’ve heard rumors of 4 day weeks. We got letters home about “many changes” expected in the coming year and to “please be understanding” as they adjust to drastic budget cuts.

So, looking over at this pile of expensive school supplies doesn’t really feel so great. Because I think we should be giving so much more. Something is very wrong with our system when cutting back on education to save a buck in our paychecks is morally acceptable.

My husband and I are hardly rolling in it. We’re upside down on our home thanks to an already shaky Florida economy. We have stacks of bills and 10 year old appliances kicking out on us just like everyone else. But if it would help our schools to buy this stack of school supplies once a month, I would.

But somehow I don’t think a monthly drop-off off clorox wipes and reams of paper will solve our budget problems.

So this tax-free weekend I don’t feel like we saved anything at all, really. I’m just afraid we’ve lost too much already.

Is motherhood something to be laughed at? Because, you know and I know that there are times when mothers completely lose their sense of humor. Poof, gone, lost, for a very long time. At 4am with a screaming — or giggling, wide-awake — baby. At 5pm, the witching hour, when dinner isn’t ready yet and you’re ankle deep in toddler tantrums. At the grocery store when you can’t seem to get down an aisle without screaming at your fighting children. Motherhood can be slow, endless, Chinese water torture, threatening to pull you deep, down into stewing pits of parenting despair. I’ll admit that it’s the hardest thing I have ever done.

And that’s why finding any outlet to laugh at parenting is so damn important.

And that’s where “Motherhood, The Musical” comes in.

I was asked to review this musical, now playing at the Straz Center in downtown Tampa, last week. And, since I am sucker for musicals (don’t even get me STARTED on my obsession with “Wicked”) and since I just really like the folks at the Straz, I was 100% down for some funny mom theater. Plus, I’ve seen lots of Facebook statuses raving about the show: “I laughed! I cried!” So, I was excited to check it out.

I rounded up two very deserving moms from my work to come with me and we set out for the Straz after a particularly crazy week at work.

The show was in the Jaeb Theater which is a smaller, cabaret style theater. We found our seats around a small table, surrounded by (no surprise here) many other mothers gathered for the show. The space was intimate — which meant a comfortable, more connected experience. I was impressed right away as the theater staff began the evening by reaching out to pregnant moms in the audience. They also sold pins with the profits going to autism research. And they even had cute “Motherhood, The Musical” postcards on the table which we could fill out and they would send for us if we dropped it in a mailbox in the lobby. (I sent one to my mother-in-law.) I have to say, the people who work at the Straz are just nice. They smile, they ask you how you are, they take pictures for you, they just make the whole vibe comfortable and welcoming. And, being a theater dork from way back, I think that really helps set the vibe for the show itself – so “cheers” to them…

Now, what did I think of the show itself? It was really great. Truly. But let me start with a couple negatives first.

Admittedly, they touched on a few cliches. You know, “we’re not gonna take cooking and cleaning anymore”  kind of thing. The naive pregnant mom, and the “knowing”, jaded other mothers hell bent on scaring the crap out of her. Mini-vans, grocery shopping, and husbands that have very little to do with parenting at all.

However. They took these typical motherhood cliches (which are only cliches because they are common experiences, by the way) and turned them into gut-busting, musical hilarity. The women who played the four mothers in the show were FANTASTIC. I kind of want to be friends with the divorced mom and the working mom. No, really. I want to have drinks with them because they have to be that awesome in real-life. (Hey ladies, email me! I can try to be awesome too!)

Also, the lyrics and the music in the show are both excellent. The lyrics are very well written, just FUNNY. Cliche or not, the mini-van song was hysterical. They took the sagging and leaking experiences of so many mothers and made anthems out of them. Even the “no more cooking and cleaning” thing was awesome. They rocked out. And I laughed. A lot.

And so did the women around us. Seriously. Women were howling, and stomping the floor, and standing, and cheering. Clearly, this show connected with the majority of the audience.

I also cried a little. No, I did. The song about “Every Other Weekend” in which the divorced mom sang about what it is like to be alone every other weekend. And how the kids come home spoiled by their fathers and she has to be the bad guy, and how she manages… well. I totally boo-hooed and said a little thankful prayer that I don’t have to experience weekends like those.

I don’t think this is a show for the majority of husbands. (Maybe some, but certainly not mine. His eye-rolling would have annoyed the hell out of me.) And, I don’t think this is a show for women who have no interest in parenting yet. I know one woman who saw it, but who isn’t anywhere near ready for children, and she said it “scared the crap out of her”. That said, bring your mother. Bring your mom friends. Bring your pregnant daughter. Bring the moms at work and the moms on your block and the teachers of your children. I suspect they will love it.

Also, if you’re going to get hung up the cliches and parenting generalizations, just check those at the door. Relax. Have fun. Let yourself laugh. Don’t take it too seriously. This isn’t supposed to be heavy stuff or some wildly prophetic social commentary. Its fun, and very funny. And it’s obviously something many, many, MANY mothers just “get”.

Cheers to the Straz and the awesome actors who rock that show out night after night (I kind of want your life). You did a fantastic job. Thanks for reminding me to laugh at this mothering stuff and then leave me ready to get back home and hug my boys super tight. Laughing like I did that night made me take a step back, accept the good and the ugly of this motherhood thing, and simply appreciate it so much more.

Want to go see it now? Get $29 tickets to see “Motherhood, The Musical” at the Straz Center through August 28th. Use promo code TIX29. The offer ends August 12th, though!  Restrictions and charges apply.