These kids.  These days.

If you’d have told me two decades ago, at age 23, that there would come a time when sitting at home on a Friday night with my kids watching old James Bond movies would be preferable to just about anything else I could think of, I’d have scoffed.

If you’d have told me that I’d spend a lot of my time at age 43 in a state of worry because one of my children was learning to drive a car, or figuring out how to be a good boyfriend, or navigating the perils of being a freshman in high school, or deciding just how much mean girl behavior will be tolerated, or whether it’s cool to show how smart you are, or which socks go with which shorts, I’d have shaken my head in disbelief.

If you’d have told me I’d often not be able to sleep because I would question myself so critically about every decision I had made that day for, about or because of my children, that I would lie in bed and ache to go wake them up, snuggle up beside them and talk to them – to tell them there is nothing that would make me stop loving you, to say I’m so proud of you I’m full to bursting, I’d have laughed and said you were nuts, that no one was ever going to be as important to me as all that.

If you’d have told me two decades ago that my heart would forever be walking around on the outside of my body in three other people who would break it with their brilliance, and their curiosity, and their independence, I’d have laughed that scoffing laugh again, but deep inside, somewhere the universe was listening,  I’d have said God, I hope so.