Political Mama

Last night I had a conversation with a woman who was the director of a cooperative preschool in San Francisco for thirty-seven years.

I asked her if it had changed much in all that time.

"Kids are the same," she said, "But the parents are totally different. All they worry about now is whether the kids get hurt. They don't realize that in order to be whole people, they have to experience pain as well."

That hit me. I'm less protective than the other people I know in this suburban Shangri-La I call home, but my boys are always in my line of sight. I know where they are and what they're doing at all times. I make them wear helmets, and I stand behind the two-year-old when he's on the jungle gym. In the end, the idea of their pain is horrifying for me, and the idea that they would suffer at all is enough to make me want to throw up.

I think about all the mothers who have children in the armed forces as well. How powerless and lost they must be not knowing or understanding what their children are doing. And also how proud and hopeful they must feel to have raised children willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for their country, which is the most noble thing of all.

I read about one such woman this evening. My heart goes out to her, and all of the countless mothers around the world whose children have fallen victim to circumstance, be they Iraqi or American, from North Korea or Niger where they will have another two months to wait for assistance.

As I watch my little boys play with their overpriced little trains, I can't help but sympathize with a parent who feels it may be okay if their child never feels pain, even if it means they might be a little less than whole.