Lost & Found – An Obligatory New Year Post

I think I found it.  I didn’t really know it was missing. 

 

I spent all of 2011 pregnant or with a baby attached to me.  I had a couple of good friends with whom I hung out tons last year and they’ve drifted away.  A baby can be pretty isolating.  Not being able to run races, dance, drink, stay out late, or even shop on my own has kept me at home, tending my family.  It has led to frustration with my life and myself (too much alone time is bad for me), and frustration with Tony, even though he is supporting me the best way that he can (he can’t feed the baby, but he sure does try to let me have a walk with the dog every night or other such quick sans-child activities).

 

But what I really needed, what has really changed my whole perspective in just a few short hours, was some fun girl time.  It started with a quick dress shopping trip on Wednesday to attire myself and two others for a wedding tonight and continued with a bachelorette party on Thursday.  I was sober sister, which can be frustrating, but it wasn’t.  It was a whole ton of fun, and I danced and sang and squealed and loved my friends and it was a total blast and I now feel refreshed.  I’m all right again. 

 

I tried to explain all this to Tony and he said, “Why do you think I would rather play basketball than work out at the gym?”  It seems that this communion with other men, sweating and jamming elbows into each other and exchanging new swear words or whatever is the equivalent to me spending time with the girls, just being a girl.  For a few hours, not being someone’s mom or wife, but just another girl, out to have fun.

 

So that’s it.  That’s the only resolution I really have for 2012: to have more fun with the girls.  Oh, there are all the other things we will do anyway and for which I don’t need a resolution, of course.  I will love my boys, we will take more vacations, we will fly to Phoenix just the three of us, Tony and I will take the boys to France, I’ll lose the baby weight, etc. - but those are all plans.  There are big things in store for the Cooks.

 

I’m a bit sad to see 2011 go.  I turned 30.  I had a beautiful, healthy baby boy (who is now sitting up unsupported and is still so, so happy).  My other little boy turned three.  Sometimes I wish I could just stop the clock and have more hours in the day to play with them.  Of course, other times, I wish I could speed up time to get to bed sooner.  All in the life of a mother of young people (I was going to write “young mother” but that isn’t true, really), I suppose.  At any rate, I can’t change it, so I’d better roll with it. 

 

Cheers to 2011!  Welcome 2012!