Somehow I manage to fritter away these Saturdays without Sami. Now that I am staying home with him, I feel the loss of him in a different way. It’s not quite so wrenching, not as raw as it was a few months ago, but still I don’t know quite what to do with myself. Pre-Sami, I used to make plans with friends, or there would be standing plans with my husband. Now that I am single, I always seem to forget to make plans. In DC, you have to make plans with people. There is little room for spontenaity as all my single friends tend to be booked up far in advance. My mommy friends are busy with their own families on the weekends. So I often find myself alone.

I had these impressive aspirations to write all day, but somehow I found numerous ways to distract myself out of it. It is so easy to use motherhood as an excuse to procrastinate. But on a day like today, that yawned wide open in front of me, I found lots of time not to write.

Blame it on the perfect weather that we had today. I told myself that I could not bear to be indoors writing. The highlight of my day was sitting on a bench in Rock Creek Park under the dappled sunshine. An intense wind made music of the leaves in the trees. I soaked in sunlight and I sat and I breathed and it was very, very difficult to be still. My mind kept wandering, of all places, to the new fall wardrobe I would like to amass. I fantasized about boot-cut cords, wedge-heeled boots, a fluffy sweater, the perfect coat. Then my mind berated itself for thinking such unenlightened thoughts. “If my mind is to wander, it should wander to somewhere far more lofty, right?” said my mind. I should be thinking about world peace. No. I should be thinking about how to unravel the tangled mess of my life. No. I should be thinking about how to serve others. It is embarrassing to admit the degree of my desire to consume, my desire to look good, all of which is really about the desire to be loved.

What a relief to see my son again tonight. I felt complete again. For some reason, he didn’t cry when his father left, as he usually does. I held him in my arms and I rocked him to sleep. He has discovered that he can loudly smack his lips, and he found that endlessly entertaining. He’d smack his lips for a while and then say, “Loud! Loud! Loud! Loud noise!” Then he demands that I sing “Moonshadow” by Cat Stevens, his favorite lullaby. Then he needs to make sure he has everything he needs to sleep: teddy bear, puppy, and bottle. There’s a method to his pre-bedtime madness. I do my best to help him set the stage for sleep. I wonder once again if I’m insane for not having sleep-trained him. I think briefly that if I have another child, I will sleep train. Then I remember that I just don’t have the stomach to let my child cry. I start to get restless and anxious at how long it takes him to go to sleep. Then, somehow I wake up and I come back to reality: my cute little guy is smacking his lips, and he’s adorable and funny, and it’s delicious to hold his solid, warm little body in my arms. It’s really an honor and a pleasure to rock him to sleep, however long it takes, however involved or intricate the process may be. I continue to be amazed at how my mind makes torture from heaven.