Big Night Out

After 6 weeks of having my new baby girl attached to me and living my life in three hour increments, I decided to try and go out without the baby for a nice dinner. My good friend Stacey was in town, and we needed to celebrate her birthday. We decided that dinner at a great italian restaurant would do the trick. However, in order to pull this off, there was a great deal of logistical manuevering required.

First, we had to get my WH to agree to meet us at the restaurant instead of heading home after work. This way, we could switch cars, he could take the kids home and we could have the most amount of time possible to enjoy our dinner out before I had to feed the baby again. He kindly agreed, and we put our plan into motion.

We arrived at the restaurant 45 minutes before our reservation. We parked in the back of the parking lot so I could nurse the baby in relative darkness before heading into the restaurant. After feeding her, I took her around to the back of the car to change her diaper. It was raining and the wind was blowing which made a baby who doesn't like being cold a little upset. Add to this that she required not only a diaper change, but an outfit change due to some explosive gastrointestinal issues and you start to get an idea of the obstacles I was facing. But I would not be deterred. I kept my eye on the ball.

Somewhere, inside that beautiful, dimly lit restaurant, decorated with little white lights, a nice corner table waited for me, holding the promise of culinary delights with foreign names like bruschetta and creme brulee. My escape from mommydom was beckoning me as I stood hunched over a screaming baby in the driving rain.

Soon enough, I was on my way. My WH had assumed responsiblity for the little ones, and I was free to be responsible for only myself for the evening.

As we entered the restaurant and walked to the hostess stand, I felt a sense of accomplishment. I made it. I made this work. The hostess told us to have a seat and that our table would be available momentarily. Sensing a couple minutes to gather myself up, I headed to the restroom. I would actually have a chance to go the bathroom without a 2 year old trying to flush the toilet a million times or trying to manuever a stroller in a room clearly not designed to accommodate such contraptions. I even had time to stand at the sink, washing my hands with warm water - water that I had time to wait to heat up instead of my usual routine of trying to prevent OBB from running out the door while at the same time trying to believe that manically rubbing my hands together under cold water with a little soap would actually kill germs. I glanced in the mirror to see what effect the rain had had on my hair. Not bad, I thought. Not bad at all.

So as I walked to the front of the restaurant and sat in a little enclave waiting to be called for our reservation, I was feeling pretty good. I had managed to feed the baby and get the kids taken care of for the evening - all while managing to look like a real person. No spit up stains adorned my shirt. No telltale diaper bag accompanied me to the restaurant. I was just me. It felt great.

As I sat there feeling good about myself, I got more comfortable in my chair. I leaned back into it, took a deep breath and casually crossed my legs. It was at that moment that I was snapped back into reality. As I brought one leg up to cross another, I glanced down at my shoe. Screaming at me from the bottom of my black patent leather loafer was a little trail of white toilet paper hanging off the end. It's as if the toilet paper was saying "Look at her! She's not really a real person! She's a mommy trying to look like a real person! She doesn't even know how to use the bathroom without bringing it with her!"

At that moment, I knew there really was no escaping my mommyhood. It would follow me, find me wherever I went. And I decided that was fine. I had to relent and embrace it. After all, it was something I had tried so hard to be - a mommy. I was just looking for a brief vacation from it. One night - just a couple hours actually. But as I looked at the toilet paper, and Stacey and I broke into hysterical laughter, I realized it is something you truly never escape. It's always there with you. And I think that's a good thing.