Disney Princesses on Ice

I love being a mother… mostly. I admit that there are days when I wouldn’t use that particular adjective- weeks.

After a hectic couple of months I was anticipating a very pleasant three weeks with Brooklyn off-track and all my girls home. Nothing to do but pretty much whatever we wanted. We made a fort under the pool table and had lunch. We sipped hot cocoa to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. We made a Carmel-apple run through a snow-storm, road bikes together, played with friends, read books, and spent a day at Wheeler Farm. And my children were grateful and told me I was the greatest mother alive and then a unicorn came and projected a rainbow over our house and we all lived happily ever after.

False. What really happened was that I romanticized motherhood and my kids brought me back to a harsh and dimly-lit reality.

I wish that I knew what magical combination of structure and enjoyment would make my girls happy. Because any one of said activities would have put me on cloud nine as a kid. But they were not on cloud nine. They fought with each other almost the entire three weeks. They scratched, hit, bit, and emotionally abused one another by day. Brooklyn threw germaphobic tantrums by night. Neither through rationing Halloween candy, nor by consistent time-outs, nor by any method known to man would they chill. And I was on the verge of cancelling the last, most special, most exciting, most expensive treat of all. That which Andy and I had kept secret for over a month and were looking forward to experiencing with our princess-worshipping daughters.
Disney Princesses on Ice

But I didn’t. And I’m glad I didn’t. Because for two hours my girls didn’t fight. For two hours they sat in delighted awe, totally on cloud nine. Because Brooklyn actually leaned over to me and said, “Mommy, I love you. Thank you.”

And for two hours I loved being a mother again. There isn’t any other adjective.

Moral of the story: When you can’t win your children’s affection any other way, you can always pay Disney to do win it for you.

  • Posted by Diana Sortor
  • November 12 2009

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