Our Y, like many, has an open floor plan, so
the sights and sounds of all the various fitness styles share space. Recently,
as I awaited outside the room that would become my Pilates studio in five
minutes, a raucous gaggle of children used it as a gymnasium. With fits of
laughter, the kiddos were running, skipping, hopping on the same wood floor
that would host my "mind/body" class at the top of the hour. Through
the glass wall I could see a line of parents on a side bench watching their
children and mostly reading their phones. I was once that bored parent, longing to do
my own thing. And yet there I was, about to
do my own thing and longing to be one of those bored parents.
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This isn't my car radio, but if it was the presets
would be one public radio station,
two classic rock stations,
and three heavy metal stations.
I've heard Running with the Devil
more in the past six months than in
the previous 30 years. |
Meanwhile, from the weightlifting room on the
second level blasted Van Halen's "Running with the Devil," instantly
taking me back to high school.
I heard a theory that for parents, life is
split into thirds: 1.) pre-children, 2.) children, and 3.) post-children. That
moment, awaiting my class, it was a sensory mashup of all three stages. My
ears registered Van Halen’s electric running riffs, my eyes focused on the
children’s running, and my chest ached for the transition running me over.
For approximately two minutes, I was
suspended in a concurrent trifecta of mothering phases. My current position of
freely choosing how to spend an hour because my kids are older. My previous
stage of mind-numbing tedium to field their dreams (for which I feel nostalgia,
rational or not). And my pre-kid high school stage attending rural keggers with
watery beer, late 70s heavy metal, and its own rigid system of social
stratification (for which I feel no nostalgia, totally rational).
Nostalgia is not my
nature, usually. I’m pretty sure I have "reverse nostalgia" as I’ve
heard it called. I miss what I am not going to do, and who I'm not going to
meet. However, I admit to being plenty nostalgic in heading back to independent
agent after almost two decades of direct motherhood.
Actually, I still kind of
like Van Halen and I’ve been hearing a lot more of the likes lately. With
18-year-old daughter mostly gone, 16-year-old son dominates the presets on my
car radio, which now consists of one public radio station, two classic rock
stations, and three heavy metal stations. Every time we ride together I run three ways: I am
transported back to those dreadful farm field keggers, I offer free driving advice, and I think about two years into the future when this kid will be gone
too.
I am, however, learning how to quit running it forwards and backwards. I’m learning to turn up the volume and enjoy the music.
