It’s evening. 11 pm already. I cleaned up the house a bit before I go to bed. Not because it really needed to be picked up (I am the luckiest woman living in a household with three 
neat little boys and an amazing husband who holds it all together and is not afraid of chores), but because I am too tired to work, and too wound up to go to sleep.
I pick up boys’ schoolwork (even Blais brings his ‘work’ home from pre-school and proudly shows me how he “finally learned how to draw a flower”) and look it over: Evan’s neat and beautiful handwriting, Dante’s 105% on a spelling test.
Earlier at the theatre we had a dress rehearsal for this weekend’s “Alice in Wonderland”. I watched Dante scampering around playing the White Rabbit, delivering his lines with confidence; Evan picking up dance steps he had never done before, enjoying every beat; and Blais laying in the first row absorbed in the story.
My boys make me proud, happy, fulfilled, and grateful.
Today is September 16th – Dante’s ninth birthday. I had put a small little birthday card into his lunch box, on which I wrote how rich and beautiful my life is because of him.
Two days ago, he had asked me why people make a decision to get married and have kids.
My favorite way to answer a question like that is to offer two opposite perspectives and let him make a conclusion.
So, I told him how, when I was single and very famous I had everything I wished for, I had a beautiful life. I had the music, which made a lot of people happy, fans and amazing concerts with wonderful musicians. And I could stay up late and sleep late in the mornings and no one would wake me up. And my bed was big and soft and I could stretch across it and have all the covers just for myself. I would lay there listening to the sound of the birds outside my silent bedroom.
And how when I got married and had children I still had everything I wished for. I had the music, which made a lot of people happy, fans and amazing concerts with wonderful musicians. And I could stay up late, except in the mornings I couldn’t sleep in, because the little boys would wake up early and ask for snuggles and kisses. And my bed was big but crowded with little feet and little arms that would kick me all night long and pull the covers off the moment I would finally get all cozy and warm. I would lay there listening to the laughing boys who were under the attack of Tata, the Tickling Monster. (”Tata” is “Dad” in Croatian)
Dante looked at me and smiled: “I think I will like having children when I grow up”.