At peace

For once, I feel at peace.  Maybe it’s because of our happy and silly week end with the children, rushing from one event to another, eating snacks along the way, bantering, singing along to songs playing in the car, and making penny wishes into the fountain outside of our mommy and girls’ lunch date.  Maybe it’s because the children’s play therapist was saying that DD1 is showing some resilience and that maybe her conflict isn’t as much attributed to her dad as it is just the normal “how do I fit in now that the fairy tale wedding is over?”  (Although, this is not to lessen the information that DD1 and DD2 share with me from what comes to their dad’s house.  Yes, a factor, but maybe not as big a factor as we first thought?  Maybe?)

Maybe it’s because I am sensing more strength in DD1—some days she is super engaged in how dad is ‘feeling,’ but other days she’s simply, ‘uh huh. Yep. No. nope. Yep” when talking on the phone with him, so maybe she is learning how to hold her own, how to place her boundaries, how to separate herself from him.

Maybe it’s because I sense a softening on A’s part—that he is genuinely making an effort to ‘let go’ what we can’t control and focus on making a positive life for the kids and our family.  Maybe it’s because I’m seeing DD1 slowly come back to her former, pre-wedding, bonding self with A.  Maybe it’s because of relaxing all together this week end, catching up on a favorite movie, or reading books together every night, and the giggling ensuing when A helps me get the girls into bed.  Maybe it’s because we planned a social event around DD2, who is always waiting for and following DD1 around, and she had a blast with her bestie, hanging out and having a grand old time.  Maybe it’s because we skyped with A’s dad—the children’s only known ‘grandpa’—as both mine and my ex’s are deceased, and the girls asked grandpa when he would come and visit.

Maybe it’s because my job is going very well, despite certain challenges, I feel like I’m “making a difference” in the people we serve and maybe even for my staff.  Maybe I feel proud that the “higher” I’ve grown in my career, the more humble I feel about what I do, because the main reason I’m successful is because of the people who work with me.

Maybe it’s because over the week end there was a conversation in the car that went like this:

DD1:  Is Barack Obama alive?

Me:  Yes, he’s our president.

DD1:  Well who’s going to be our next president?

Me:  I don’t know, it depends on who we vote for.

DD1:  I want to vote for a girl!

Me: Me, too!

DD2:  Me, three!

I love that they just assume they can vote for a woman, it never crosses their mind that they can’t!  This was further underscored by this speech given at the UN, by an amazing young woman who can be a role model for my daughters, Emma Watson.

Maybe it’s because despite the vitriol I’ve lived through and continue to field (i.e. nit-picky email about haircuts and messages of forgetting to turn in DD1’s school fundraiser form), the bigger picture lately has been one full of happiness and love and growth.