How Many Women Are You?

I don't know about you, but life with children sometimes brings out the best in me and then, sometimes the worst. I mean let's be honest. The monotony of staying at home can be overwhelming. I know that sounds crazy because sure, living a slam packed crazy busy life can be overwhelming, but a monotonous one? How can the seemingly meaningless albeit necessary tasks of home life be overwhelming? Well, I tell you (and it's my blog, so there) that they certainly can be.

But the cool thing is I think I've found a pattern here. When I am at my most frazzled and bored yet overwhelmed state there is always a common denominator. It is when I am living my life as wife and mother ONLY that I feel like I'm going to lose it. Now I know what some people will say to this, that I should count myself fully blessed to be a wife and mother and that there is no greater call in this world. I'm not arguing that at all. It is incredible to be a wife and it is a great joy to be a mother to my two darling girls. But guess what???? There is more to me!

Ahh! Shock. Gasp. Guffaw if you will, but it's true. And it is when I have neglected the other parts of myself that I begin to feel like I'm drowning, barely keeping my head above water and gasping for air. It makes sense I guess, you can't starve people and expect them not to revolt even if these people are just other parts of yourself.

So, just who are these other women you may ask?? Besides wife and mother, I am sister, friend, daughter, comedian, teacher, singer, poet, artist, healer, student, thinker, nudist (just kidding), chef, philosopher, speaker, bohemian, dancer (when no one's watching), and free wheeling' feminist. Ah, that felt good.

There are so many facets to every woman and we just so often get jumbled up with daily life that we forget to give voice to those other ladies that are just as much a part of who we are. It is when I bury these others that I become cynical, critical, mean, ugly, indifferent and just plain depressed. So why is it so hard to let ourselves be all these things at the same time? There's a part of us that feels that we need to express ourselves in small bits so as to not rock the boat too much. That we need only to decide which one of us the other people in our lives need us to be the most and we let that one shine.

Now, I'm not saying that I have a choice today whether or not I'm going to be a mother or a dancer/speaker/etc, I dot. Once a mother, it isn't ever a role you can hang on the shelf, even for a moment. But I'm saying that maybe me and my selves can co-exist. I mean after all, isn't that what I want my daughters to see? Don't I want them to know all of me and see that they too can be many women and not just what the world says they need to be? We are not Kodak moments preserved in some photo album. We are not slivers of complete people, but are full round and whole.

Ok, so I'm rambling a bit. Got all up on my soap box. So what now? All I can do is to be aware that all of me is here for the being. All of me needs to be fed and to be expressed. All of me is pretty darn cool!