Page 5 of Woman on the Verge

Somehow, despite being harried (I assume) stay-at-home moms, they all look fit and fashionable. At least one of them must be a social media influencer. Most wear expensive-brand athleisure—the labels visible and making me feel like the nerd I was in high school all over again. Some wear trendy high-waisted jeans that look to be tailor made for their bodies, accentuating tiny waists and perfectly shaped asses. Since I became a stay-at-home mom, my daily uniform is a gray hoodie and a pair of sweatpants from Walmart. I look like someone about to rob a liquor store. And I have not figured out how to incorporate exercise into this new life—perhaps I should ask these Pilates-bodied women their secrets—so the fanny pack of fat I’ve had since the girls were born has grown in size. The other day, Grace poked my stomach and asked if I was having another baby.

I gave the Professional Moms a smile that didn’t show teeth and said a silent prayer that Grace would not shout “Penis” at anyone. She has become obsessed with the word and is known to incorporate it into random verbal bursts: “Doggie Penis Poo-Poo Head!” I still have a note in my day planner to ask her pediatrician if this is some form of toddler Tourette’s.

In a rare moment of idyllic sisterhood, Grace and Liv played in the sandbox with their dolls. There was no whining. Grace showed Liv how to rock the baby doll in her arms, and Liv watched intently, her little mouth agape in wonderment at her big sister’s wisdom. These moments, when they are utterly delightful, are my sustenance.

“Mommy, let’s play ice cream shop!” Grace yelled, jumping up from the sandbox.

I hate playing ice cream shop. Whenever we play ice cream shop, time slows. I cannot explain this phenomenon, but it is true. Nobody tells you about the boredom of parenthood. I don’t know if withholding this information is an act of kindness or cruelty.

“Why don’t you keep playing together for a bit?”

“Noooooo,” Grace protested. “Ice cream shop!”

She came to me, grabbed my arm with a force that would be considered harassment in any other context, and tried to pull me from the bench. They really do think my body belongs to them.

“Ice cream!” Liv shouted.

I gave in. For the next twenty minutes, we played ice cream shop, which involved Grace and Liv saying “Ice cream for sale, ice cream for sale” while I crouched down to their level and pretended to be a customer. I’m going to need knee replacements by the time I’m forty-five, which will cost a fortune. Maybe they’ll give me a two-for-one.

“Mommy, you need to order,” Grace said, stomping her foot.

One of the hardest parts of motherhood, at least for me, is the expectation to be both childlike (while playing make-believe, for example) and authoritative. I do not know how to strike this precarious balance.

“What flavors do you have?” I asked.

Grace rattled off a list of flavors, most nonsensical, like “unicorn rainbow.” I ordered chocolate and handed my invisible money to Liv, her face alight with joy at this responsibility. I could not help but pinch her cheeks and say, “You are the cutest ice-cream-shop worker there ever was.”

We repeated the ordering-and-paying process about three hundred times. Sometimes I ordered the “wrong” flavor, and Grace became unreasonably upset. “Notstrawberry, Mom,” she said, as if I was the crazy one. It’s worth noting that Grace called me Mom before she ever called me Mommy or Mama. She incorporated the latter terms upon realizing that they were more endearing and would serve her better in negotiations.

In the beginning of my stay-at-home-ness, the mind-numbing pretend play used to make me feel like I had fire ants crawling all over my skin. I was going through a kind of withdrawal from regular life. Now there are no fire ants. I’ve imagined the parts of my brain thatwould have lit up with activity on an MRI before having gone dark. There was a news segment a while back about a power outage at a New York playhouse. It was empty, pitch black inside, and I thought,That’s my frontal lobe.

I looked at my watch. Almost eleven. I recently told Kyle that I wanted to write a book titledKilling Time: A Memoir. I couldn’t read his expression, but I think it was one of confusion. I really did consider it, as a project to buoy me. I would include anecdotes along with photos of the mundanity of life. It would be marketed as the first book created completely with an iPhone—using the camera and Notes app. For a few days, I took some photos at the park, tapped some thoughts into my phone. Then I got tired of being interrupted every twenty seconds and gave up on the endeavor.

Grace left the “ice cream shop” and went to play in one of the plastic tunnels, Liv following after her.

“Mommy, come here,” Grace said with a mischievous smile, her face peering out of one of the round windows in the tunnel.

I was fairly certain she was going to have a booger on the tip of her finger and would place it in my palm and ask me to dispose of it. I went to her anyway.

Surprisingly, she did not hold out a booger-adorned finger. Instead, she said, “I have a secret” and motioned for me to lean in.

At bedtime, the girls and I do this—whisper into each other’s ears. I say, “I love you to the moon and back, forever and ever,” and they say it back to me. It’s one of those moments that compensates for so many others.

I leaned in, her breath hot on the side of my face. “Mommy,” she whispered. “You. Are. A. Penis.”

She erupted into giggles.

“Grace,” I said. I try not to give the penis talk much attention. “Five more minutes, okay?”

I set the alarm on my phone. I am attempting to train the girls to respond to the sound of the alarm. I am attempting to turn them into Pomeranians.

“Okay,” she said, though I knew it wouldn’t be okay when the five minutes were up.

“Oh, sweetie, what happened?” Kyle said. He was giving Grace the exact reaction she wanted, rewarding the tears that rolled down her cheeks with his attention. Of course, Liv saw the attention Grace was getting and then also started to cry. Their ability to create tears spontaneously fascinates me. In good moments, I silver-line the meltdowns by envisioning one of the girls—probably Grace—winning an Oscar. She will thank me in her acceptance speech. She will buy me a house in Malibu.

“Mommy said we had to leave the playground,” Grace whined, falling dramatically into Kyle’s open arms. Liv pressed herself against Grace’s back, and Kyle included her in his embrace too.

“What a bummer,” he said.

---