Cutting the cake

[pegkerr]

It's Friday night, usually my night out, but not tonight. Avril Lavigne is pouring out of the boom box in the girls' room, and it sounds as though a herd of elephants is thudding past my office, because it's the night of Fiona's sleepover 10th birthday party.

They have been loud, excited and happy ever since the first guests arrived a little before 6:00. Really really loud. I've taken both girls aside several times, trying to tell them to calm down. It's futile, though, and I know it.

They had spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner, spraying the table and the floor below with parmesan cheese. I was in the kitchen doing the dishes when I looked over and saw Fiona beginning to carve up the birthday cake on the kitchen counter. "What are you doing?" I asked her, exasperated.

She looked up at me, surprised. "I'm cutting up the cake."

"But we haven't had a chance to light the candles or sing Happy Birthday yet. Fiona!"

She looked down at the cake, back up at me, and all the happy animation drained out of her face. "But I . . . I . . ."

"I wanted to take a picture. Good grief, Fiona."

A little wrinkle appeared between her eyebrows. "We could still take a picture."

"But you've cut it up already," I snapped, knowing I sounded bitchy, but unable to keep myself from saying it. "It's too late. Why did you do that?" I compressed my lips and then spoke again, trying to gentle my voice. "Was it just that you were so excited that you forgot?"

She nodded. I turned back to the dishes. Fiona disappeared, but I knew she hadn't gone back out to the dining room where all her guests were in happy uproar.

I rolled my eyes, stripped off the dishwashing gloves, and followed her. Sure enough, there she stood halfway down the basement steps, her back toward me.

Yes, I had done it. Monster that I was, I had made my daughter cry at her own birthday party.

I sighed and came down the stairs and put my hands on her shoulders. "I didn't mean to make you cry, honey. I'm sorry. You're right. It's not important. I only wanted a picture of it. There's no reason that the cake can't have a cut in it first."

"We could sort of turn it away a little," she said, her lips trembling as her tears spilled over. "Then people wouldn't see the cut."

"It doesn't matter. We can take the picture of the cake just the way it is and not worry about it."

"I wish that you would put the pictures in photo albums," she said abruptly. "We have all these pictures you've taken, and you haven't put any pictures in any albums for five years."

She was perfectly right. I had carefully put the pictures in albums, cataloguing each one, for a number of years. But then I had Delia, and our lives got so busy . . . immediately I could feel it, my old familiar enemy, rearing its head at Fiona's accusation, going right for the jugular: Working mother's guilt. "I could be the sort of woman who works full time during the day to save up money for your college education," I told her with some asperity, "and comes home and stays up late every night putting photo albums together--" You could if you didn't waste time doing things like writing books. And LiveJournal my enemy whispered in the back of my brain. Shut up, I told it firmly. "But it's not going to happen. I'm not a perfect mother, Fiona. I'm just not." I sat down on the steps and took her into my arms. She nestled into my lap and wiped at the tears spilling down her cheeks. "I held you for the first time, ten years ago today. I held you, and I told you that I loved you very much, but I wanted you to know that I wasn't going to be a perfect mother. I knew I couldn't be. But I would do the very best that I could."

"No, you didn't."

I frowned. "Yes, I did. I've told you this story before, about how on the day you were born I held you--"

"Yes, but that wasn't ten years ago today. I wasn't born yet."

She was right, the little literalist. Ten years ago was the 28th. She was born on the 30th.

"Okay, ten years ago today you were kicking me in the ribs. But that's not the point. I'm not perfect, honey. And that cake doesn't have to be perfect, either. Let's go upstairs and dry your face and serve it up to your guests."

So we went back up to the kitchen and mopped her up with a Kleenex. Fiona went back out to the dining room. I lit the candles and brought the cake out and everyone sang happy birthday. Rob took pictures.

Nobody commented on the cut in the cake.

Peg

Comments

[eal.livejournal.com]

I doubt this helps at all, but if I were inclined to be a parent, I think I'd use you as my role model. I think you handled this really well. You had a moment, and you made her feel okay without sacrificing yourself. I think that's awesome.

Oh, and from what I remember about slumber parties, the kids either won't go to sleep or will get up to raid the kitchen in the middle of the night. We woke my Dad up at my eleventh, and I was terrified. He's not a middle of the night person or a morning person for that matter. But he fixed glasses of milk for everybody, cut cake, and then told us not to tell Mom. I'm sure she had to wonder where the dishes came from the next morning 'cause I *know* he didn't do them.

Beth

[sundancekid.livejournal.com]

I think you dealt with that beautifully. As someone who has cried at more than one of my birthday parties, no one ever tried to cheer me up like that. Much better than telling her to toughen up.

Allie

[til-midnight.livejournal.com]

You sound so much like my mother. I'm tearing up. Don’t worry about being a working mother. My mom has worked my entire life and I’ve never felt neglected. And she also had a section of photos she’s never been able to put in a photo album.

[peacockharpy.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday (early) to Fiona! And go get some earplugs or you'll get no sleep tonight.

I hope when Meg is ten that I can handle my frustrations with her (and I know I'll have them!) as well as you did tonight with Fiona. You didn't just ignore it, you went and made it right with her.

My mother has never ever put all the piles of photos we have into an album, ever. The digital camera is making it a little easier for me, but my husband and I aren't much better... ;)

[kishmish.livejournal.com]

I hope Fiona has a Happy Birthday.:) She`s lucky to have you as her mother; it was an awkward situation and you dealt with it beautifully. You and she seem rather alike to me; both of you are inclined to be realistic somewhat.

[morganmalfoy.livejournal.com]

My mother still pulls me aside for being too loud when I have people over. That won't get better with age.

And the stuff you do now to balance your own life with theirs will help them more than they realize. For example, I think my Mom gave me too much, she worked very hard and up until the last few years, she would never have spent any money on herself. I think I'm a bit spoiled and selfish because of this. Do I blame her? No, she was trying to de what she thought was best, and I'm glad that she does more for herself more, but if you were to never to things for yourself, have personal time, etc, then how accurate would their view of life be?

I commend you for caring so much.

-M

[http://users.livejournal.com/_lindsay_/]

This probably gets said a lot but Moms are just cool people. I mean, you change irrevocably when you become a mother. The working mom thing is hard. as morganmalfoy said our mom has worked as long as we've been alive but in no way do I think she didn't give us enough time or attention. I understand now what my parents have done to give me the things I have and the opportunities I've had. (Morgan and I went to Europe last summer and upon getting my passport my dad mentioned he'd never left North America.) I feel so blessed to have such generous parents and I'm inspired in what you write about your life with Fiona and Delia: they sound like such great kids. It's just a wonderful view into the intimate moments of family, they're beautiful, thank you for giving them to us. :)

[vass]

immediately I could feel it, my old familiar enemy, rearing its head at Fiona's accusation, going right for the jugular: Working mother's guilt.

And you're ahead of millions of mothers all around the world just for realising that that's you and not Fiona, and that she's not the enemy.

I can remember my tenth birthday party. At least I think it's my tenth I'm rememering. I changed my mind about which cake I wanted on the last day. My mother accommodated me. My parents gave me a Play-Dough magic garden set that grew beautiful dough flowers. I wanted to save it for later, but I had to share with my friends to be sociable, and they mixed up the dough together and ruined it, and I pitched a tantrum. I must have been so hard to deal with - in fact, I know I was, and for much more than just that occasion. I never want to stop honouring that girl's feelings, but *Gods* I must have been hard to deal with.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

This reminds me strongly of the poem I wrote on Zorinth's tenth birthday, when I went, as I then did every day, half way to school with him, to where there were no more roads, and he ran off with his friend for the first time without looking back:

Ten years ago today
you slipped out
from inside my body
like a ship from harbour
beginning the long slow journey
of your separate breath,
your own life.

Today you are ten years old
you walked uphill
and did not look back
did not turn or wave
or care that I was watching,
standing on the quayside
as your ship sails outward.

In ten years time,
where will those sails take you?
You will be off, an adult,
entirely your own person.
I will send presents.
I will call you and speak
across a wake grown wider.

You were so small, so helpless,
entirely inside me,
then such a short distance from me,
now growing up so well,
my friend, my equal,
your life spread before you,
to steer on the oceans of your choice.

[skg.livejournal.com]

Oh my--this made me cry. What a beautiful thing to tell your daughter.

*mops face*

I think you sound like a wonderful mother.

Don't let the guilt get you--no one is perfect. But you sound pretty close.