I haven't written anything beyond the occasional face book status update in many months. You see, sometimes when I say what I'm really thinking at 11:47 on a week night, I wake up at 7:13 the next morning with a horrible panicked feeling- "Did I seriously just admit my Easter Bunny contempt to everyone I know?" "Did I describe in detail my weird crush on Joaquin Phoenix?" What the what? I was kidding- whatever. So harelips are kind of hot. In a piratey sort of way.
Anyways, I have held a six-month long internal debate whether society as a whole is better off with or without my thoughts. And while the jury's still out, I do take comfort in the fact that my influence- for good or evil- is minuscule. Like a tiny little scule. So small. Almost non-existent. So, I worry needlessly. That said, I really don't like Easter Bunnies or any bunny for that matter, cute and fluffy as they may be. A pink-eyed devil tried to take my arm once and I've not met a bunny since that made a good impression. Just think of all the bunnies you know- Playboy, Bunicula, Roger Rabbit, the bunny from "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." Despicable creatures all.
Which does not segue into "I am terrified of the future" like I thought it would. My little girl is starting first grade in two weeks, meaning two out of three of my children will be gone until 3:30 every weekday until they finally grow up and leave me a withered college-dropout with a disproportionate hatred of bunnies (there's my segue!) Although I love to watch my children grow and become increasingly independent, the reality of my eventual uselessness has been crashing down on me like a sack of hot nickles. What will I do in three more years when all of our children are in school and I have eight hours of uninterrupted nothing? The possibilities appear in my head so numerous and loud, it sets my head spinning. The thing to do is go back to school and get my degree, obviously. A degree in what I don't know. Creative writing? Not very profitable. None of my interests have ever been profitable- and if they are not profitable does it warrant a student loan? And all the while that nagging ache in the pit of my stomach- "have I been a good mother? Am I a good mother? Will I be a good mother if-?" Eventually settling into that dull, depressing pain- time's insistent progression- they're growing up so fast.
I am afraid to make them my entire life, and afraid not to. And often afraid that it wont matter anyway if I completely lose my mind. On the upside, some very successful writers have been insane. Lewis Carroll for instance- writing about rabbits, obsessively worried by the ticking of that bloody pocket-watch...
