Wait for the turn-around

On slowing down to treasure the mundane

Photo by Jelleke Vanooteghem on Unsplash

“Motherhood will be the best personal development journey you’ve ever taken.” I still remember this comment from a nurse when I was 5 months pregnant. I breathed in the tenderness of her advice with resolve, not knowing how often my experience of motherhood would leave that resolve dangling on cliffs of regret.

Last week I dangled. On Friday, my husband dropped our daughter off at daycare, and I asked him how it went. His smile touched his eyes as he said, “When she got to the top of the stairs, she turned around and waved at me.” I could imagine my daughter taking her triumphant last step, one hand holding her teacher’s, the other on the lower of two handrails, lovingly placed for the toddlers. It’s these kind of memories that I replay over and over and help me cherish being a mother.

Except this memory wasn’t mine. And had never been. I realized in that moment that I had never waited for her to climb the stairs. I would say my goodbyes at the door and then immediately head to the car. I had to get to work. Didn’t I? Regret pulled at my stomach as questions and images raced through my mind. Did she turn around at the top of the stairs only to see that I had gone? Did she turn for a while but stopped, realizing that I wouldn’t be there? Had she ever turned around at all?

I will never know because I didn’t wait.

For several minutes after that exchange with my husband, all I could think about was my next daycare drop-off and how I would wait for her to climb the stairs. Would she turn around?

In those minutes, I realized anew the extent to which my preoccupation with work was poisoning my life—something that I have recognized before but, like all clever beasts, was able to sink insidiously back into the shadows to deliver a stealthy cut.

This week at drop-offs, I have waited. One day she looked back midway up the stairs and sniffled. (This was a day where she didn’t want to say goodbye.) The other days she waved goodbye at the top of the stairs at her teacher’s prompting, not grinning, not frowning, not sad—just contemplating this new routine perhaps.

And that’s enough.

I’ll always wait for the turn-around. I can take 30 seconds away from going through my morning email to wait for my daughter to climb the stairs, to turn around (unprompted or not) and see that her mother is still there. Waiting to say goodbye again.

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Thanks so much to Camilo Moreno-Salamanca for feedback on this piece.