{ so i happened }

late last night i sat in a driveway with one of my closest friends and we agreed to stay up for a meteor shower meant to take place five hours later. we drove to get iced coffee and then we watched australia (which you should really see as soon as possible). we talked about people we miss, uncertainties, and miniature horses. at 2am we drove to a deserted parking lot, threw patio furniture cushions on the ground, and flopped down to watch the stars. shivering in my down coat, i thought to myself that if i could i'd never leave that spot.

an emerald green meteor shot through the sky, and we gasped.

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most of the women i know are mothers with anywhere from 1-3 kids under the age of 5. they share their worries and triumphs with me, and i compare notes across the board. i'm beginning to feel like a mommy impostor, because i find myself contributing regularly to mommy conversations even though i have no children. no one's called my biological bluff yet ("hello!! unused uterus here, which means i have no authority on any of these subjects whatsoever!!!"), which i take as a sign i've been listening and re-articulating well. (i also think i remind my friends that they may be mothers, but before that was true, i knew them as single women, newlyweds, accountants, teachers, knitters, camp counselors, party-lovers, dreamers, and i call out those aspects of them which i imagine is refreshing.) so instead of feeling alienated because of my unused anatomy, i'm trying to engage with motherhood the only way i can: by asking questions, sharing thoughts from an outside perspective, and processing the adaptation and transformation of motherhood with these women.

it's been a bit startling to find that so many of the struggles of new (and repeated) motherhood are universal regardless of age, personality type, temperament, expectations, or religious background. perhaps the most pervasive adversary to the vulnerability of sleeplessness and responsibility for another human's survival is the concept of The Perfect Woman.

she's a figure who dances in all our heads, and we know she's a caricature. but repeated exposure over time fools us into seeing her as a correctly proportionate ideal not just to strive toward, but to consider attainably correct and morally good.

bullshit.

The Perfect Woman spins and twirls in our minds whether we're mothers or not (instead of feeling pressure to lose all my baby weight in 3 weeks, purée organic food every morning, and bedeck my offspring in cruelty-free outfits in the perfect morning light of their pinterest-worthy nurseries, i adopt the belief that i should be a yoga-addicted, kale-obsessed, career-oriented size 4 superwoman with perfect skin who does a juice cleanse every three weeks). there isn't anything wrong with trying to become the best women we can. all ideals don't need to be toppled. but let's not pull ourselves down in the process of trying to stand tall.

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and i realized that the reason why good things

were not happening to me as often as wanted them to,

was because i in fact was a good thing that needed to happen.

i needed to happen to me, to other people and to the world.

and so i happened.

{ c. joybell c. }