You may have heard the commonplace expression “possession is nine tenths of the law” – a phrase that refers to how ownership of something is easier to maintain if you already have possession of it. In courts of law, lawyers argue and judges rule on individual cases, discussing evidence with words like “documentation” and “clear and compelling testimony.” But on the street? If the shirt is on your back, it belongs to you, man. I can’t help but note how “possession is nine tenths of the law” applies to way I settle disputes in my living room.

Take, for instance, the case of Blue Chick. This stuffed toy was gifted to my son on Easter. A corresponding Yellow Chick was gifted to my daughter. Blue Chick held no particular appeal to my son, until relatively recently when his little sister decided to pair Blue Chick with Yellow Chick. She aimed to collectively refer to them as The Chickies while pushing them around in a hot pink grocery cart. Of course outrage shortly followed. The very instant Blue Chick was to become part of The Chickies, my son declared the toy to be the most important thing to him in the world. So, who exactly has the right to possess Blue Chick? I’d love to say that my children determined a way to work out these differences on their own. But no, such freedom would lead only to violence. A higher authority was required to intervene.

Whose testimony was more compelling? Was there documentation to review? Could joint custody be arranged? Well, perhaps, but Mama has no time for such long-range adjudication. In lieu of making a hard and fast ruling on the property of my children, I enforced the “possession is nine tenths of the law” statute. In other words, whoever has the Blue Chick shall keep the Blue Chick for a period of time lasting ten minutes, at which time whoever wants Blue Chick shall be given Blue Chick for another period of ten minutes. I issued these decrees while wielding a spatula for my gavel and an apron for my judge’s gown. I set the kitchen timer, and then prepared to repeat the whole ordeal in a matter of minutes. In the meantime, I comforted myself with the idea that while this solution was crummy, it was also working well enough to get us through the afternoon. And that’s enough to keep the peace in this law-abiding community.

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My parents recently came down with serious colds. I found myself at the grocery store late in the evening buying them a round of feel-better-soon foods: a roasted chicken, orange juice, whole fruit, Gatorade and a quart of soup. As I filled the cart, I started thinking about how often my mother had taken care of me when I was little. I would lie in bed and watch the trees outside my window, feel the gentle weight of a cat near my feet and wait for the tray. The tray had everything I would need to get better: saltine crackers, medicine and chicken broth. Now, finally, I’m in a position to offer my mom and dad the same kind of care. As I loaded the groceries in the car and pulled down my hat to ward off the rain, I felt deeply comfortable with my place in the world. I also found myself hoping that somehow I could pass that feeling along to Caroline, my own little girl.
I realized, driving the soup across the dark, wet roads, how I want to invest in Caroline – to nurture her when she is sick and when she is well, to show my love for her through everyday acts of caring – so that in the years to come, she can take pleasure from loving those in her life, whether it is me and her dad, her own babies, or a circle of friends so close they feel like family. I hope Caroline will know the sweet, secure pleasure of being the person who delivers the chicken soup, not only the person who receives it. I want to love her in such a way that she becomes an affirming, stable presence for those around her and for herself.
When I think of what my mom gave me through all those sick days when I was little, I often can only see the memory through the eyes of a little child, hot with fever, waiting for her mother. But from my mother’s perspective, I see more: a sustaining, capable presence giving out tangible love. Surely my mother felt pleasure as she nurtured me back to health on those days, likely the same kind of pleasure I felt purchasing her groceries this week. Such everyday acts carry with them larger, and more wonderful, implications. They help us carry forward a tradition of love and remind us of who we are in the world. They sustain us, whether we are the giver or the receiver.

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When my son first laid eyes on our new car, a crossover vehicle intended to accommodate our toddler and soon-to-arrive infant, he cried, “It’s a blue police car van!” As the weeks went by, I adopted the new nickname myself. I didn’t think much of it. We have a lot of little names for things around our house. Calling the car “the blue police car van” seemed relatively normal – or so I thought until one April morning.

William was taking a bath while I gazed out the bathroom window. And then, through the hedge of my backyard, I saw it. The vehicle was the precise shade of blue as our new car. It was a van. And on top was a flashing red light. “William!” I cried in genuine astonishment, “It’s a blue police car van!” He looked at me blankly. I couldn’t believe it. Not only was the blue police car van a real vehicle, but it was merely an arms-length away. The van, I found out later, belongs to one of our neighbors. It was as if William had told me about an imaginary monster and then there it was strolling across our back lawn.

I try to teach William things all the time: what his nose is called, what a red light means, the importance of saying please. That our car bears a startling resemblance to a blue police car van is one of the first things he has taught me, but I’m sure it won’t be the last. For if the blue police car van exists on our very street, what else is right under my nose that I am missing? What I really learned that day was more fundamental than planes, trains and automobiles. My son is not an extension of me, just as I am not an extension of him. By seeing the world through his eyes, my own vision can become richer and more complete – and, best of all, more fun.

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I have two toddlers, which means I have two heads, two necks and four little hands to keep covered in winter gear – not to mention the four feet, which seem to require so many socks and boots! I don’t know about other moms out there, but I think that keeping those appendages cloaked in the proper winter garb should be worth big money. Because, let’s be real, it’s practically a full time job.

The moment I exit my house, where I have collected approximately half a dozen of each item for each child, the pulling begins. Little hands pull off little gloves. A hat is left in the snow. A scarf unwinds from the neck and is strewn on the floor of the car, alongside muddy muck that instantly renders it unwearable. I arrive, at last, at some destination only to notice that my children’s feet are bare. They’ve worked the zippers down, kicked out of the boots and peeled off the socks. Need I say that finding these items in my car is a losing game?

Oh, sure, I’ve worked out some strategies. I keep the strangest hats around in case of emergency. An old hat from my extended family’s favorite football team. I’m not sure to whom it originally belonged, an uncle perhaps? A hat decorated with pig eyes and a snout from last Halloween, a bright purple hat with an unusual weave whose origins are unknown. Gloves missing their mate are tucked in a box, for the inevitable next glove that will also be missing its mate.

In addition to all this, there is a large suitcase in my basement with miscellaneous winter gear dating back to my college days. Scarves a mile long from friends who were just learning to knit. Fancy wool hats with coy buttons on the side. I can’t get rid of the suitcase, though I feel I should, in the interest of streamlining my life. I need the suitcase as a backup to my backups, because I know when I look in the rearview mirror, I will see my children’s hair, sticking straight up, messy from the hat they somehow managed to discard when I wasn’t looking. I count down the days until April. Until then, I hoard my hats – all my hats, every last hat in the house – and remind myself, “This too shall pass.”

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Because we have family who live far away, we are often piling into the car like so many sardines, accompanied by snacks and pillows, band aids and toys. We like to think of ourselves as experienced road-trippers. One of our tricks is to have a surprise to reveal partway through the trip. Like a spoonful of sugar to medicine, a treat can make an unpleasant car trip bearable. At least that’s the idea.

On a recent trip to Vermont, we decided to unveil a surprise we’d sat on for almost two years – our car is equipped with a DVD player. The little ones never knew what the gray box on the ceiling was for. Now they would find out. We couldn’t wait. Like parents preparing Christmas stockings, we snuck out to the car the night before the trip. The moon was high and bright above. Sitting in the backseat where our children would be the next day, we watched part of a movie. It was magical, transfixing. “They are going to love this,” we told each other. And, of course, we thought we’d love it, too. Less whining, more relaxing: win/win.

The next day, about four hours into the drive, we revealed the DVD player. Our son was stunned. “What’s this?!” he cried. But then he gave us a surprise. “I don’t want to watch the big movie,” he said. “Let’s watch the little movie!” The “little movie” was the menu screen. And only the menu screen. It featured jungle creatures singing a loud, grating song and repeated every half minute or so. After an hour, our four-year old could sing along. A bit longer and the baby was dancing, too. We sighed and donned noise-cancellation headphones. We listened to podcasts while our children sang and danced with the “little movie.”

What have I learned from this? Some surprises are double – you surprise your kids, and then they surprise you. And some surprises don’t work exactly like that spoonful of sugar! But now we are back from Vermont and the DVD player has been shut for a while. I find myself thinking it wasn’t so bad. After all, the kids had fun. And next time, maybe we’ll get beyond the menu screen.

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After my son’s birthday, he and I sat down to write thank you notes. We had the presents in front of us on the dining room table next to a stack of cards and stickers. William had a lot to say and his pencil couldn’t keep up. Writing felt time intensive, and fitting all the words he wanted to use on the small space of a notecard seemed impossible. So I was handling the writing. My son was talking in a fast flow of words I was supposed to take down directly, and then he’d sign the note at the bottom and decorate with a few stickers. The trouble was, some of the words he was using were not exactly appropriate thank-you card material.

“Tell her thank you for the trainset and I love it, but that the top piece is really hard to get in place and I hate that.”

I wrote, “Thank you for the trainset, I love it.”

Next he dictated, “Tell him the lunchbox is great, but that I tried popcorn inside and I hated it.”

I wrote, “The lunchbox is great.”

I was my son’s silent censor that day. I felt particularly sneaky altering his writing and knowing he couldn’t read it and catch me. He signed his name proudly at the bottom of each note. Eventually I tried to talk about it. “Sweetie, you don’t put the bad stuff in a thank you note, just the good stuff.” Though I’m sure this was the right thing to say, I’m not sure he really heard me.

Even little tasks like thank you cards arrive with unstated rules. Or, to put it another way, writing a thank you card isn’t just about learning how to write, it’s also about learning what to say. Fortunately, due to my sneaky moves, all the words we put there were worth sharing. We talked about the rules together, and I’m sure we’ll talk about them again.

All of this made me think about how we are buffers for our children. We cushion, protect and absorb little problems, giving kids time to think about the unstated rules at home before they misstep out in the world. As I noodled on the metaphor, I realized how many types of buffers there are. In rail transport, for instance, there are two kinds of buffers: a buffer to cushion the impact between two vehicles, and a buffer stop, which enables the vehicles to say on the tracks. Though I’m no train conductor or engineer, I too want to help my child in these ways – to protect him from unintended collisions and to keep him focused on how to best move in the world.

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When I was a kid, I used to watch movies with my cousin Ross. One evening, circa 1990, while sitting on the floor watching the old Batman movie starring Michael Keaton, he decided he’d had enough of me. “Quit asking questions!” he cried. “We’re watching the same movie! I don’t know why all these things are happening!” I can newly appreciate Ross’s position. I’ve recently had my comeuppance, sitting with my son watching Frozen. He’d just gotten a nasty gash in his head from a playground tumble. It was bloody and scary enough to send us to urgent care, where he eventually was patched back together with a staple. But, as anyone who has been to urgent care knows, even the simplest procedure can take hours. So we passed the time snuggling, him in a stained t-shirt with a bandage around his head, watching Frozen on the iPad.

“Why is Princess Anna not allowed to know about Princess Elsa’s powers?” he asked me. I paused the movie to discuss. But this was only the beginning. Question followed question in mind-numbing succession. When we’d been watching the film for over an hour but hadn’t yet gotten beyond the first 20 minutes, I knew he was even worse than I’d been as a child. Simple questions were easily fielded. But then he started in on the stumpers.

“Whose fault is it that the castle froze?” he queried. “Is it Anna’s fault, because she made Elsa mad – or is it Elsa’s fault, because she couldn’t control her power?” I looked at him, laughing in spite of myself. “Maybe,” I said, “it’s actually the parents’ fault, since they told Elsa to keep it a secret.” He considered this, and then said, “Is that the right answer?” I shrugged. “It’s an interpretive question, William. It depends on what kind of approach you take to the movie.” Suddenly I realized what I was saying and backtracked. We weren’t in English class, I reminded myself, but instead the urgent care. “Well, what I’m really saying is, you could argue it either way.”

And so we did, looking at the issue from multiple perspectives and discussing the evidence for each. I was amused, to a point. On the one hand, here is someone to debate with! On the other hand, can’t we just get to the part where Elsa sings “Let it Go”? I found myself echoing my cousin from so many years before. “William, can’t we just watch the movie?” Secretly, though, I hope this is only the beginning, a memorable first in a lifetime of movie discussions. We’ll just be two English majors, hanging out and passing the time.

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When I was a child, I believed my father was fluent in Spanish. His ability to count from one to ten without pause was all the evidence I needed. It wasn’t until middle school that I realized his romance language skills are basically nonexistent. By then, a number of other paternal fantasies had also been exposed. My father could not control traffic lights, as I thought when I was five (he was really looking at the lights to the side to cue the “magic words.”) He could not reliably estimate the temperature to the exact degree, as I thought when I was eight (he was cheating). And he did not know the stories behind every stellar constellation, as I thought when I was ten (he made them up). Perfect fluency in a foreign language was the last fantasy to fall. But something remained standing: I still thought my dad was a pretty great guy.

Now, with two kids of my own, I’m becoming increasingly aware of the superhuman abilities they think I possess. Last week at the YMCA, my son was flabbergasted by my ability to bounce a racquetball so hard that it almost hit the ceiling of the racquetball court, which, as you might know, is quite high. “Mom can bounce the ball better than anyone!” he announced that night to my husband. “She’s amazing!” We looked at each other and grinned. I am not often praised for my athletic skills.

With a four year-old and a two year-old, I realize now is my opportunity to indulge in some major myth-building. Will I feign competency as a gourmet cook? No. The “proof is in the pudding,” as the saying goes. But certainly other things are within my grasp. I can, at last, be effortlessly expert in whatever I choose and play to an adoring audience. And when I’m found out for the fraud that I am, my children will hopefully know something that is really true: I love them and I like having a good time with them. So, with that, I’ll just practice my own impeccable Spanish and say adios!

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My parents recently came down with serious colds. I found myself at the grocery store late in the evening buying them a round of feel-better-soon foods: a roasted chicken, orange juice, whole fruit, Gatorade and a quart of soup. As I filled the cart, I started thinking about how often my mother had taken care of me when I was little. I would lie in bed and watch the trees outside my window, feel the gentle weight of a cat near my feet and wait for the tray. The tray had everything I would need to get better: saltine crackers, medicine and chicken broth. Now, finally, I’m in a position to offer my mom and dad the same kind of care. As I loaded the groceries in the car and pulled down my hat to ward off the rain, I felt deeply comfortable with my place in the world. I also found myself hoping that somehow I could pass that feeling along to Caroline, my own little girl.

I realized, driving the soup across the dark, wet roads, how I want to invest in Caroline – to nurture her when she is sick and when she is well, to show my love for her through everyday acts of caring – so that in the years to come, she can take pleasure from loving those in her life, whether it is me and her dad, her own babies, or a circle of friends so close they feel like family. I hope Caroline will know the sweet, secure pleasure of being the person who delivers the chicken soup, not only the person who receives it. I want to love her in such a way that she becomes an affirming, stable presence for those around her and for herself.

When I think of what my mom gave me through all those sick days when I was little, I often can only see the memory through the eyes of a little child, hot with fever, waiting for her mother. But from my mother’s perspective, I see more: a sustaining, capable presence giving out tangible love. Surely my mother felt pleasure as she nurtured me back to health on those days, likely the same kind of pleasure I felt purchasing her groceries this week. Such everyday acts carry with them larger, and more wonderful, implications. They help us carry forward a tradition of love and remind us of who we are in the world. They sustain us, whether we are the giver or the receiver.

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