Here’s the truth. I wasn’t feeling so marvelous this weekend, emotionally speaking, but I feel entirely 1000% like not talking about that right now. So I will tell you about the absolute high point of the past few days: having a date with my biggest kid.
Let’s back up. For Mother’s Day, I had received some pretty spiffy gift cards from my two oldest girls (and I use “oldest” as a relative term, as they’re 3 and 5). More truth time: my initial response upon opening gift cards for a bookstore and a cafe with the designations “Mom and Me” time gave me the knee-jerk reaction of- Really? I can’t just, like, go be alone at a bookstore for an hour?
And I’m so glad I got over that potentially jackass-y thought for many reasons. (And I’m by no means saying that I don’t need or deserve time alone to read relatively grown-up books. I do. I need that time a lot. A LOT lot.) The biggest reason is that one-on-one time with my children- especially the “big” ones- is freakin’ currency. My kids (whom I tend to adore on a pretty regular basis) become downright incredible when I get to actually talk to them without wiping or shouting at someone within the vicinity of their carseats.
So Nora and I went to a bookstore on Saturday night. She was disproportionately excited about our destination until I realized it was because she had no idea what an actual bookstore was. While the kid lives at the regional branch of our library and spends most waking hours (and some borderline sleeping ones), with her nose in a book, she had never browsed a shop with books and overstuffed couches and fancy treats. So I filled her in. And it pretty much went like I had just explained how Narnia has a swimming pool out back, too. We got dressed up. Really dressed up. Because, as she told me, we wanted to look good for “the party.” (Maaaybe I had oversold it?)
And it was a gorgeous evening, too, all hot and fragrant with the scent of lilacs (which hadn’t yet been dragged to the alley to make rats nests) and plenty of parking a few blocks away from the bookstore. (Maybe it WAS Narnia!) Nora was vibrating with excitement about ALL OF THE THINGS WE WERE GOING TO READ AND DO. “Is this the store? Is this it? Can I open the door handle?” This was asked for three blocks. Finally, it was the right door handle, and we walked inside.
…Straight into the middle of a completely packed, completely serious, four-hour-long book reading consisting of- as best I can tell- people clutching wine glasses and nodding angrily. The cash register was closed, but a helpful sign directed us to bring all purchased to the cafe counter- right behind the reader’s podium.
Nora was ridiculously undeterred. “I bet they have stuff to read on all of those shelves.”
And they did. We perched on a step stool between narrow stacks where Nora- wizard that she is- found a gigantic volume of The Very Best of Scrooge McDuck. (Did I mention she’s crazy into graphic novels right now? She’s crazy into graphic novels right now.) We followed that up with a sweeter-than-sweet novella concerning the Moomins (…anyone?) and ended with a snippet of Tuck Everlasting. (Which I bought, so that we/I could sob on the relative privacy of our/my own couch.) Despite the hushed tones that I had previously assured her wouldn’t be the stressball issue that the library could be, she had a really good time. We were there for roughly fifteen minutes.
As we left, I apologized for the packed space and zero overstuffed couches. “That’s fine,” she said. “We’ll go back when we return these books.” I explained that these were ours ours. “For our house forever?! I LOVE BOOKSTORES!”
So then we went and got a cupcake. We sat on an outdoor terrace right next to the Lincoln Square fountain and we just talked. She rolled her eyes about various disciplinary issues occurring in her classroom (“…He got to the red. She was stuck on yellow. I was green all day. Why can’t people just be quiet and stay on the green?”) and nodded knowingly when she informed me that Zu and Jasper were probably asleep by then. They’re so much younger, you know.
We held hands. We read some more Moomin. We batted our eyes and requested extra straws. And as we strolled back to the car in the rapidly darkening night (“It’s DUSK, Mom! I’m pretty sure this part of the night is called DUSK”), she told me that this evening was her favorite.
“We should do it again tomorrow. And then maybe on Tuesday, too.”
(I’m with you, kid.)
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