Fake Sick

I will resist the temptation to share my thoughts about the debate with you, partly because I have been engaged in a one-way dialogue with the television set for the last two hours and partly because, well, that's not the point of the blog. (I know, I know, it's my blog, I need to give myself more freedom, I should write whatever I feel like--but I don't want this to be a diary blog. I just don't.) But in a funny way, what I will write about is, for me, not wholly unrelated.

Today, I got a call from Lily's school. Which is not unusual, in that it happens pretty much every day for some reason or another, but today I was told that Lily was feeling sick, that they thought she had an ear infection, and that I needed to come and pick her up. I admit: I was suspicious. Lily is (knock on wood) so very rarely sick, and when she is, it is always obvious. She had been fine that morning, not so much as a sniffle. Plus, I had been getting a funny vibe from her. Although she loves school so much she wishes she could go on weekends, she had made a few comments referring to the large amounts of time we had spent together over the summer, which I had halfway taken off, due to a transition in our childcare and sheer exhaustion from the previous work year.

When I peeked in her classroom, with Annika strapped on my chest, I saw her playing in a corner. It was "rest time," during which none of the children actually rest but are forced to remain quiet and calm in the darkened classroom. As soon as she saw me she ran over and threw her arms around me and Annika. I knelt beside her to feel her forehead, and she whispered into my ear, "I actually feel a little better now."

"That's great," I said. "We'll just go home and call Dr. Kaufman. See if she wants us to come in."

"I actually feel ALL the way better," Lily said quickly. "Like I don't even need to go home."

A ha. Gotcha. I knew it. But why? The jealousy over the baby has really dissipated, almost to the point of nonexistence. She loves going to the doctor too; it wasn't that. I gave her a hug, told her the babysitter would pick her up at the usual time, and that I would see her after work. She was already off, waving good-bye over her shoulder.

When I got home, however, she was curled up in a chair, reading, and she didn't jump up to greet me like she always does. I went over to her, ignoring for the moment that Annika had managed to carry the bathroom trash can out to the living room and was sifting through its contents. I asked her if she wanted to come into the kitchen with me and help me make dinner. She shrugged and then nodded. I picked her up and carried her in.

"Mama?" she said, as I opened the fridge. "Why do you have to work?"

We'd actually skirted around this issue before, but she had never asked me so directly, from a place of such genuine interest and need. Feeling blindsided, I floundered around. In the right places, but it was still certifiably floundering. I talked about how lucky I was to have some work that I loved, and that all of the work that I do, and that daddy does, is because in our family we believe it is important for both parents to contribute to pay for the things that we need. I explained that although I love picking her up from school, I cannot do it every day, and I told her about the wide variety of jobs that most of the mothers of the kids in her class have. I told her that I knew that someday she would have work that she loved that would help her support herself and her own family, whatever shape that may take, and that I would always encourage her to work hard for the things that she wanted.

She asked a lot of questions. She was listening hard. But by the time I was finished, her body had relaxed, and she was smiling again. I had a feeling she wouldn't try to trick me into pick-up anymore.

"I like writing with you, when you're writing," she said. "And I love when you teach my class." I felt relieved.

"Thank you, Lily," I said. "That makes me feel really good."

"But I will still always wish you could pick me up." I nodded. And I understood. And what's more, I felt optimistic that someday, further on down the road, she would too.