We either want to be perfect moms, or we deride perfect moms. But we only deride them because we secretly want to be perfect too.

Do we? Do we really want to be perfect?

Some people (like me) value quirkiness over perfection. Doesn’t real perfection lack passion, spontaneity, uniqueness?
Here’s two definitions of quirky:

1. A peculiarity of behavior; an idiosyncrasy: “Every man had his own quirks and twists”Harriet Beecher Stowe.

2. An unpredictable or unaccountable act or event; a vagary: quirk of fate.The word itself even sounds cool.

So when my kindergartner wore five summer dresses layered on top of one another in the middle of winter and her great aunt said she looked like a Hungarian bag lady, I was actually flattered. I thought, yeah, I’m learning! I’m learning to let go!

Anyone glad it’s Monday?

A co-worker of mine (married with no kids) just stopped in my office and asked what I did this weekend… my reply was simple, “lots of kid stuff.” She prodded a bit more and so I started to tell her all the things we did: hockey practice for my son, swim team for my daughter. Kids friends in and out of the house throughout the weekend. On Saturday night, my husband and I squeezed in a quick dinner, between sets of a musical my daughters are in.

“That’s kind of what you do when you have kids,” I added when I saw her face.

What I neglected mention was all the other stuff I did: broke up fights about the clothing, cleaned up the messy house, answered the phone about 20 times for everyone else but me, negotiated with my husband about his own plans and the plans for the kids, and finally passed out at 9 o’clock last night, lying on the floor of my daughter’s bedroom!

Then I asked her about her weekend…

She had Chinese take out and a watched a movie with her husband on Friday night. On Saturday, she went to a salon to get her hair done, spent some time shopping and then had lunch with a friend. Saturday night, she and her husband met another couple at a new restaurant in the city (she asked me if I’d heard of it… of course, I had not…) and on Sunday she did a bit of laundry, picked up around the apartment and went to visit her in-laws for dinner.

Sound civilized?

In many ways, weekends are harder than the week days. I remember dropping the kids at pre-school and saying to another mom, TGIM—Thank God It’s Monday!