I’ve missed most of my son’s first year. I missed the whole world. I missed everything because I was a drunk mom. I am not a drunk mom anymore, haven’t been one for quite some time now. Yet, I still get my reality altered on regular basis – although this time around I remember everything and everything I remember is beautiful.
My reality gets altered because I spend time with my son. Specifically, I get to see the world through him. Yeah, I know, cheesy. But no other way to describe what happens: he discovers the world and, soberly now, I rediscover it with him.
The thing about the seeing the world anew is that you can’t force it. It’s like trying to force yourself to have talent. Natural sense of wonder is sort of a talent. I mean, sure, you can try walking around trying to see everything for the first time but you really have to make a conscious effort to do so and you have to be predisposed to it (artists are, sometimes) (like Henri Rousseau). As grownups we get bogged down by the everyday crap and we forget to look up to see the world; sometimes all we see is just its problems. Grayness and the bus being late and the asshole honking his car at another asshole. However, once you are around a child (it doesn’t have to be your child either) you can see everything anew all over again. I almost missed this opportunity after my son was born but now I pay attention.
Take the glass elevator at a shopping centre, for example. I’ve ridden that thing hundreds of times. It’s fun, being able to see the people like insects scrambling down below… but then you start thinking about where to buy a hat, about having to get white shirts to go with your new jeans and, look, there’s a massive lineup at the Apple store, I wonder if they have the new iPad there?
Put a kid on the same elevator and suddenly it’s a different story. Just check out his face as he looks on — mouth open wide, nose pressed to the glass — and so you decide to hit the buttons to go up and down, and then next thing you’re squatting next to him, trying to see things out of his eye level and holy, crap, is this ever fascinating! Like, have you ever been on a glass elevator before? Really been on a glass elevator? Forget the new iPad… This is Alice in Wonderland stuff.
There are hundreds of examples like that — first time on swings, first time eating lemon, first time watching TV, first time swimming in the ocean, first time the is aware of riding the bus. Every time a kid does or realizes something for the first time and you’re around to see it, it feels like reliving, if you can just tune into it. I never believed in reincarnation but me being sober for my child’s life is grace; it’s living my life for the second time.
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