In the Venti Scheme of Things

I felt a little envious of the young, bleary-eyed woman who rushed in and out of Starbucks yesterday morning. Her oversized sweatshirt and her venti coffee helped dwarf her already slight frame. She seemed even tinier than usual, without her two-year-old twins in tow.

She is young with a touch of an old soul. I know she is tired just thinking about the day ahead, alone with her small children while her husband goes off to work, even though it is Saturday. I miss that kind of tired, the uncomplicated, explicable kind of tired. The tiredness born out of being larger than life to small children who just cannot imagine that you feel as small as they do, sometimes, at least in the grand scheme of things.

Those years are a blur of vivid moments, virtual selfies that never seem to fade. Me, wheeling a double stroller against a steady stream of morning commuters heading to the El, complaining out loud to my sleeping babies (much to the amusement of passers-by) that I needed sleep. Me, standing on a narrow strip of grass on a sunny fall day, a baby in my arms as I pivot to watch her older siblings play on adjacent soccer fields. Me, feigning interest at a parent teacher conference. Them, looking at me as if I had all the answers. Them, questioning my answers. Them, wondering when I became so dumb.

Thanks to social media, I can still get glimpses of their lives, even though I am rarely in the daily picture. Sharp and vivid, these photographs often don't seem as real to me as the ones in my head, the ones that capture three childhoods marked my seemingly interminable days that passed by in a minute. Days that made me feel tired and put upon and overwhelmed by responsibility. Damn I miss all that.

I ran into the young, bleary-eyed woman hours later; again, I felt a little envious. She was still wearing her oversized sweatshirt, but with one child in her arms, the other holding her hand, she had grown into it a bit. They were off to the local hot dog joint for lunch, and then, if mom had her druthers, a nap. I was enjoying a leisurely telephone conversation about life with my nineteen year old, thinking how nice it would be if we could duck out together for a char dog and cheese fries.