What was my point again?

Where did I go? Two small sleeping bodies, independently alive, out of nothing. (Not nothing. An embrace, an intention, a hope, a love. Of course. But still, what atoms?)

Monkey keeps confusing "country" with other words - he asked me the other day, "Why does our universe not have a king?" (He had been surprised and delighted to find out that kings and princes existed, and still exist, in real life. I had to dig up photos of Juan Carlos and Elizabeth II on the computer, and then I told him about revolutions and guillotines. I was pretty sure that he's the sort of four-year-old boy who would enjoy such things. Also, I was trying to distract him from actuality with history.) I don't quite know why that's relevant.

But I? I'm only just coming back from it. Having a baby is a nine-months-and-two-years tunnel for me and I've been inside for most of the past five years. It's simple and comforting to be so single-minded, consumed with just the well-being of the small being, looking out for yourself only in the most basic of terms: if I don't eat, I may faint; if I get sick, getting up in the middle of the night will be harder; things like that.

It's not so much where the rest of me is as when. When do I get a chance to just be, without demands or a countdown to the moment I'm called on again? A thing as simple as being alone is so rare these days that the mere act of going shopping without my two small decoys - they draw the eye, you know - makes me feel almost invisible. Remember how it felt when you were 14 and you were convinced that if you wore anything other than blue jeans and a sloppy sweater, everyone would look at you, would point and laugh, would remark on how that girl is wearing a skirt, or a red top, or whatever it was? You felt the eyes of the world on you, and nothing your mother said about how nobody else would really care could convince you otherwise? Well, this is the same in reverse. I'm sure nobody notices me on my own, because the only reason they notice me the rest of the time is because the kids are so darn cute. (Or so badly behaved, take your pick.) Without them, I can dart and weave through the aisles like a wraith: unencumbered, silent, free to think my own thoughts without interruption and without having to constantly plan a strategy to get everyone on board for the simple movement from a to b.

I don't mean invisible in a sad, scurrying, self-effacing-mouse-like way, mind you. It's more about freedom - I can put my head down and get things done, or I can swing my arms and strut and pretend I'm 24 again, because it's not as if I feel like a middle-aged houselady (to quote Kristin, who is the least middle-aged houselady possible and yet continues to call herself one). I had a facial last week, and when the nice beautician asked me how old I was - presumably in order to know whether the size of my pores was shockingly bad or shockingly good - I faltered in the middle of my answer and thought "Thirty-seven? Thirty-seven? No, there's something wrong about that. Surely I'm twenty-seven. No?" Maybe it was because I was lying down under a sheet partially disrobed, which is always a good way to feel insecure, but the decade just sounded all wrong to my ears.

But mostly, I find that getting older is less about feeling insecure and more about being confident in my own choices. I like that about it, if nothing else.