What I'm Learning as a Grandmother

Before my grandson was born, I never really understood the hype about grandchildren.  We’ve all heard it. “Wait until you have grandchildren then you’ll see that there’s no greater joy,” would be a typical refrain. 

I thought I understood when my grand son was born a year ago.  Holding him for the first time in my arms was a wonder.  But there was, at least in my mind, such a build up about being a grandmother that my own reaction, albeit emotional, didn’t feel that it measured up to all the hype I’d heard.  Now I think I understand what the hullabaloo was about. 

What helped me was a quote shared in a yoga class I recently attended. The gist of it is that the biggest enemy of parenthood is life’s distractions. The remark resonated with me because I’d just come back from LA visiting my grandson.  I was alone with him a lot of that time. I got to pick him up from daycare every afternoon before my daughter got home from work and then spend the next few hours just focusing on him.  

My only responsibility, besides picking him up (in LA traffic) was dinner and that was easy.  My daughter had it waiting, plated, in the fridge.  She took care of his bath and bedtime routine when she got home. All I had to do was to drive in that traffic for fifteen minutes and keep him out of harm’s way for a few hours.

Every afternoon I could take him in his stroller along the canals in Venice and look for ducks or dogs.  Sometimes we went to the local fancy and over priced grocery store where everyone smiled at him. Sometimes we walked along the boardwalk beside the beach.

            I raised three children and spent a lot of time in grocery stores with them, taking them to the park and to the beach. But this was different.  When I was raising my children I had other responsibilities.  Besides meals there was the general upkeep of the house, the up keep of my family’s busy schedule and my writing.  I was always trying to find time to fit in an hour or two a week.  

It was also a time, more than thirty years ago, that most women stayed home and daycare really wasn’t an option.  I was raising my kids because that was my job and my husband was out working and leaving child rearing and home chores to me because that was, as we saw it back then, my responsibility.

            Spending time with my children when they were small wasn’t always as idyllic as it was with my grandson.  I’d get glimpses of it when I’d take them to the park the first time they’d go down a slide or sit on a see saw, or at home, just before bedtime when we’d curl up together with a favorite book.  

But there were also the distractions:  the list of things I needed and wanted to accomplish that filled my brain.  I think that’s the meaning of the quote I referred to earlier.  During those early years when I was raising my children, all those unimportant details of life, were always intruding and preventing me from being completely present.

Do I wish I could get a do-over?  Of course I do.  If I got one, I’d definitely focus more on the time with my children and less on picking up the house or worrying about the minor details of life or even my writing. But since there are no do-overs, at least I get to be a grandma and that’s pretty spectacular and maybe makes up for what I missed the first time around.