Alison Krauss’ song, The Lucky One, describes what in some circles we’d call a commitment-phobic guy. He’s as free as the wind to come and go, doesn’t excel at anything except drifting along, yet is so charming that even though he loves and leaves, he’s “loved by many and hated by none.” She chides that he’s the lucky one, to have no ties, no responsibilities, no burned bridges in his wake. He is unencumbered, free, the envy of all.
He’s also alone.
Me, I usually think I’m the lucky one. I have just about as many degrees of freedom as most working mothers/wives/neighbors/daughters/friends – not very many. I am encumbered from sun-up to sundown. I have roots, and the only time I drift along is on an over-planned weekend escape when I might get an hour or so to look for seashells. And then I resume attending to the others in my commitment-full life.
The people to whom I am tied – the ones who reduce my time, funds, energy, original brunette hair follicles – are a kind and forgiving bunch. They are generous with praise, hugs, smiles, “thank you’s”. They are generally happy to see me and to hear about my world. They are polite and mostly well-mannered, my gang of freedom-inhibitors, my jailors.
So it is with some surprise that a hand-written thank you note, from an 11-year-old girl on my son’s school trip I recently chaperoned, has been so meaningful. It’s a hand-written note, addressed to me (with J_’s Mom written underneath to make sure it would get to me). The words trail a bit down on the right-hand side. Some letters have been written over a few times to make sure they’re just right. There are squiggles and swirly lines, drawings of birds and trees around the border. A huge sun shining down from the top of the sheet. Fish swimming in a little pond. The dots above every “i” are big open circles. She wanted me to know that I helped make her experience really fun. She remembers me coming on last year’s overnight trip, too. She’s glad I did. She thinks I’m – and here I’m quoting – “nice and loving and smart.”
It was an unsolicited note – the teachers didn’t have the kids all make thank-you’s like they do in kindergarten and the early elementary years. This one is all due to the girl. And her overly-committed, overly-responsible parents who probably have zero degrees of freedom. In her world of already-diminishing freedom – homework and school schedules encroaching on every last minute kids have these days – she used hers to express gratitude to someone else’s Mom.
Maybe its girl freedom, not guy freedom: the ball and chain of all our relationship ties free us up to be loved and prized and known and appreciated. I don’t need an open road, the collection of mini-experiences in which I’m never known and I never know anyone else.
I am free to write in the hours after my son goes to sleep. I am free to wander the aisles of the grocery store to create the umpteen millionth meal for my clan. I have had the freedom to walk the halls of my son’s schools, to participate in the classrooms, sit through deafening assemblies, go on field trips, chaperone overnights, know his teachers, bring baked goods for birthdays, fill out endless permission slips. I have known some of my son’s classmates since kindergarten. Moms from preschool know me at the drug store. I have the freedom to be known by lots of 11 and 12 year olds at the market, pizza place, frozen yogurt shop, anywhere around town where tweens congregate. I am woven into the lives of those who surround my son, and in some tiny, tiny way, I matter. This has been my personal goal in parenting a son – as we all know sons leave home and build lives that only peripherally include their mothers – to be relevant in his world.
I’ve got a hand-written note that reminds me: I’m the Lucky One.
Unsolicited Thanks