Writer's Almanac. 9-27-12

I was listening to the Writer's Almanac on NPR on my way over to my lunch nursing session today. I caught the poem from Sharon Dunn, "Genes." And then the last few lines: "He will make his own brave life, he will not remake our lives, nor redeem us, nor pity us." Wow.

That's definitely a challenge. I've always thought: "I don't want to be the best Mom; I want to be the best Mom for my child." I really don't care if I annoy the pediatricians to bits; I just want my daughter to be happy and healthy. And so it goes. 

It's so easy to want to try to recapture parts of your life that you think that you missed through your child--to want them to be more beautiful, more popular, and such and for that to reflect somehow on you. If Boop wants to be an academic great, if not great. As long as she can manage to have gainful employment and not do things that are unethical and immoral, I will have done my job. I hope she never feels that I am trying to live my life through her, or that she somehow has to save me from something. I hope that she can be her own person and contribute to the world in her own little way.