Your rose is the happiest moment of the day. The thorn, the worst part of your day: what's bothering you or keeping you back. And your bud is what you're excited about learning or doing next.

Roses have been on my mind lately. When I'm trying to calm down I visualize being in one. A giant red rose. I curl in the center like a baby, a yellow pollen blanket under me. The petals unfurl around me.

Love, that's what a rose means. In that visualization I do, it means self-love. Self-love. I didn't know I needed it, but apparently it's what I'm supposed to be learning. Have I mentioned I hate learning? I've come to recognize that my wires are crossed. Learning = failing. I'm working hard to change this belief, and to be kinder to myself as I grow. (How do you do that self-love thing? Did you always just...love yourself unconditionally? Is it learned? Does it come and go?)

I had a rose-related breakthrough recently when a wise woman who knows me well said: "You don't have to constantly be exceptional, Margot."

"Yes I do!" I shouted. And then I laughed a little and explained, "So I can keep torturing myself for failing!"

She, much older and calmer than I, said: "Lower your expectations. Especially of yourself."

It was a revolting idea.

"But I want to create! Beautiful things!" I said. "And change the world! Make it better! Help people! And be a great parent! And–"

"It's not realistic, or kind to yourself, to think you have to be phenomenal all the time," she said. "To create, you need down time. Time when you're just normal old you. You need time to gestate."

Then I thought of a rose, and why it's exceptional: it's not always blooming. The bush hibernates. It makes rose hips from faded flowers. Its roots stretch into the cold deep earth to bring up nutrients. The leaves do their photosynthesis thing.

And when things are ready, it blooms.

I feel like I'm coming out of a dark winter. So grateful to see the late-Spring sun. I have to move past being mad at myself for breaking down. I know this whole process–my recent crash, and evolving identity, and awkward inner growth is leading to something. More roses. I'm sure of it.

I haven't yet instated the rose/thorn/bud routine with my family. I'll have to add it to my list of to-do's. If you're inspired, and you actually have dinner with your family regularly, please do it and lmk how it goes.

Heart,
Margot

That sounds very dramatic, right? One reason I'd never say any such thing.

But it has been a long time since I've written you. I've been thinking and fretting and falling apart a bit. Happens sometimes. You know, when you've got too much going on? And you want to know the answer, and where it's all heading, but you don't? Yeah. That's where I've been. Feeling sucky.

Before my suck-fest, Rafael was home for a gloriously long time–5 months including the holidays. Everything was rolling. And then...

1) Rafael got a big project in LA. Followed by another one.

Yea! Work! It pays for everything! Sweeeeet.

But with the exception of two nights, he was gone for four weeks. And here, we had Sickness. Alejandro had a fever for fours days so I couldn't work, Story woke up one night with croup (terrifying to be alone holding her, wondering how I'd take Ali to the emergency room.) It all just got to me. It was rough. And when I say rough, mean hard-as-shit hard. I wish I was tougher. I wish I could do it all.

And I pretty much did, for those four weeks.

2) Then I crashed and burned.

You could call it a "depressive episode" or just a "big deep crash" after an extended period of stress. But it got dark there in my head for a bit.

Today I feel better. But I'm still looking at the Modern Parent's Puzzle. How to balance competing needs:

• to hang out with family at home
• to pay for that home
• to give the tots the best caregivers and education; the best start
• to pay for all that TLC
• to do laundry and buy food and clean up again and again
• to have down time
• to talk, even once in a while, with friends
• to sleep
• to laugh with the kids and listen to their stories and take them to the park and read books and eat popcorn with them

Is this list ambitious, or just a given? I clearly haven't figured out the solution.

I just have to feed Alejandro, wash my face, and go off to San Francisco now.

More later. Thanks for being here,

Margot

Then, as he always does, Rafael came home. He looked like a zombie, but the sun shone on our family again. His project was complete, the impossible done. He was no longer working 16-hour days himself. He roughhoused. He changed diapers. He drove to and from preschool. And, blessedly, I was not alone working and not-sleeping and trying so hard and not-managing it all.

But by the time the good man returned from his earning expedition, I'd drunk the last dredges of my Survival Juice. I was looking at him like, "WTF are you DOING here? You haven't BEEN HERE. We (the kids and I) have a SYSTEM!" It's always like this. We need time together to relax, to work together again. But I'd been a madwoman trying to accomplish more than possible. Ali and Story needing more than I can give. And the big ole bills from our superhero nannies...It wasn't pretty.

So I'm defeated today, and without a plan for what we'll do to be happy together forever. You know, because that's like obtainable?

A plan! A plan! How my brain wants to go to a happier future. Late at night it noodles away, adjusting a series of imaginary levers which never seem to balance. People might say: "Just don't work!" And then I have to say, What if I dialed down work? But then we'd be further behind. I can do the math. It's like this:

Mortgage + Preschool + Sharecare + Household Expenses = Wha? Huh? Wha? Huh? <suicidal thoughts, thoughts of running away, etc.>

so...many...levers

So we're looking at refinancing and into daycares and au pairs. It's hella fun shit, let me tell you.

If we moved to a random somewhere that we could afford if I didn't work, and I found myself more alone as Rafael worked his ass off elsewhere, I'd seriously lose my mind.

Should we move to LA, where he shoots most of the time? Perhaps. I could go SoCal. But do we have to? We loves the Oaktown. And our nearby friends and family. And I really do love my job.

If only I could give up on taming the Modern Parenthood Beast. Meanwhile I'm just sucking its fumes.

You probably know exactly what I should do. "Margot!" You'd say to me, just as I'd say if I were trying to convince you to see the light. "You should just..."

I want to know the answer–but part of me can't hear it. I'm overwhelmed with information right now. I'm resistent, too, I have to admit. Why? Because any one of the solutions will require change. And associated, usually overblown but you never know, risk.

Change and risk. Easy to recommend, hard to implement.

So if you read this, and see me, don't bother trying to tell me the solution. Just give me a hug.

Yay. Vulnerability.

I hate it.

Margot

It's crazy beautiful. Alejandro and Story Jane, my husband, our life...I feel blessed. "The stars shone on you," said our caregiver the other day. It's true. I feel it, and want to share.

Thankful for every moment, and for you.

Margot

I was wallowing in woes. Most of my own making.

Earlier in the day I'd had good friends visit–Jen and Karissa. We drank coffee and sat outside in the sunlight as I tried to rapidly decompress. I kept looking for my holiday spirit. I welcomed it, but hadn't given myself any time. Jen, one of my oldest friends, juggled baby Story and cleaned up our kitchen. Karissa rolled out my rock-hard crumbly pie dough. She's like that. You can hand Karissa a tortured lump of "pate brisee" or a crying newborn baby, or ask her to hang a picture in your house, and she's got it. We talked about the hard knocks of 2011. I tried to tell them how much I appreciated seeing them.

I got messy after they left. I cried because year-old Story Jane wouldn't sleep, and I needed her to. (Sleep is my parental Achilles heel.) I was crying because I felt alone. And because I was remembering past holidays–Christmases of my childhood–and got swept away in the hope and disappointment. (Santa. Right. Happiness forever. Right.)  I kept crying and looking at my daughter watching me cry from her high chair. I hated that I wasn't together. And that despite Jen and Karissa's help, the pie wasn't together, much less baked.

So why didn't I just go buy a goddamn pie? Or arrive without dessert?

Humbled by this question, I have to admit I needed a good breakdown. I bawled for more than two hours, and then I felt better. I was still snuffling, but calm as at last I drove, with the pie and the baby intact, to Rafael's family's house. I was to arrive with puffy eyes and a fresh cherry pie with a small heart cut in the center of the top crust. The cherry goo had sloshed in transit and the pie looked just like I felt: an achy bleeding heart.

No matter–I walked in and it was the holidays. Raf's mom offered me a glass of wine and I sat down with Story and got a thousand hugs from a very happy Alejandro. I'd arrived. Not on time, not perfect, but present.

I'm learning that's the most I should expect and strive for. To be present. I'm still squirreling my way around it, but it feels so good when I'm there.

And note to self: it's probably best to avoid such drama in the future. Next year I'll take a couple of days off before Christmas. And maybe just buy a damn dessert.

Hold me to it.

Love you,

Margot

FOUR

Alejandro Marcellus is four going on fourteen. He's kind. Articulate. Extremely logical. Persuasive. His interests include: Fighting. Star Wars. Things that get blown up. "Walking skeletons." Lego video games on the Playstation. His scooter and new bike. Playing with action figures, particularly those with guns, light sabers, knives, swords, scythes, axes, cannons, or other weapons. (You know. Right? Ahem.) He gets shy when he walks into a room full of people. Alejandro's also very into us, his family. He gives great hugs and kisses to mommy and daddy. He high-fives most everyone else.

But I worry that I don't understand him enough. Because, seriously, I've never been into pretending to shoot people. I remember a lot of talking stuffed animals in my childhood games.

And our wills can collide. Alejandro doesn't give up. He will ask and ask and ask and reposition his request and ask again. It drives me crazy. I don't know where he gets it.

All of this adds up to the fact that I'm in awe of the boy. I try to keep calm, and yes I'm in therapy, but he just seems so shockingly bright I'm confounded. I just love him so much, I hope I can give him what he needs.

ONE

Story Jane Fernandez. A girl named Story. Oh yes we did. She's now a year old. A beautiful girl–the name fits her perfectly. She's rather magical. Good natured and outgoing. Her first "sign" was dog (panting) and her first word was "hi." "Hi" is a constant. She says it waving to strangers: "Hiiiii!" It's delightful.

She started walking at 11 months, and since then she is EVERYWHERE. Holy heck! She's bashing into everything. Falling down. Into everything.  It's like scattergories in our house and in my brain. Hard to keep up. And of course she doesn't sleep through the night that often. She has the same dumb parents as Alejandro. While we've done much better on the sleep training front, it's still so hard to let her cry. Why does listening to a baby cry for twenty minutes seem much harder than "just" getting out of bed to return a pacifier? I don't know. Sleep-addled habits don't die.

So that, my friends, is why I'm crawling into December. I'm trying to keep up with a two-foot tall wobbler and a three-foot tall teenager.

And it's winter. Shouldn't we all be hibernating?

Please?

I have excuses. In short: my job, and our tiny baby children. The job: a new role being defined. The children, aged four and one. Four and one, goddammit. Have you no pity?

Of course not. You're me.

I drive myself crazy expecting perfection. It's a mindset that grants moments of elation. But then the rest of life sucks.

One isn't supposed to berate oneself for being a failure all the time.

I'm totally over that now, blog.  That's right. I write in you because you're supposed to be short and frequent and fun. Not precious.

So there. I'm blogging again. BTW, I HATE the word blog. It's quite unattractive. See the title - that's right, that's what I really think.

But I like talking to you, and to the few real people whom I might reach through you.

Thanks for that, and for forgiving me about the not writing thing. And the title. We're cool, right?  Right.

Love ya,

Margot

I promise that next time, I will park upstairs. Now that I know. I get in the car, which is new to me. The dashboard is covered in rubber. The seats are covered too, in cloth. I picture my mom caring for this used car. Wrapping up its cracks. Driving from the lot, I understand I've underestimated the time. I thought it was plentiful but it was based on having my own car, my usual routine.

I decide it would be faster to ride a bike. I get on it and start towards the bay bridge. I am biking as fast as I can. I am smoking, too. I realize this when i see a tower of ash on a cigarette in my hand on the handlebars. I take a deep drag of its nastiness. In the same moment- this is under an overpass, like on Division by Bryant - I realize there's no way to bike across the bridge.

Now I am trying to figure out the nearest BART station. I'm depressed. I realize when I get there, to the other side of the bay, I'll have so far still to go on the bike. It's impossible. I'm impossibly late. I pull over on the bike, still smoking that nasty stick, a disappointment, to study a map.

I have the option to bring Story Jane with me to work since Hot Studio has a formal, and awesome, babies-at-work policy for returning parents. It's a great benefit, and it helped the first few weeks, but I couldn't swing it any longer. I was a single parent returning to the workforce in a new role. After being off for almost seven (!!) months, I was ready to just get back to work. And frankly, I'm not the most chill mom in the world. More specifically, I freak out when my kids aren't sleeping. So trying to get Story to take a nap–while meeting new people and setting up new processes at work– was a recipe for a mommy meltdown.

The ongoing identity crisis: I didn't say "I'm a mother," but "a mommy." I also have a full time job and a fancy new title. Transitioning between these two roles is what's most awkward. I can get so into work, and so fulfilled by it, to be honest, I don't leave at 5:30 as planned. I probably haven't pumped at the designated time. My commute home is super stressful, 'cause I know I'll miss my daughter being awake. My husband, if he's home, has to cover for me. We haven't made dinner plans. Even leaving at 6:00, I'm too late. I've f'ed it up, and I'm not even home yet.

When I walk in, I've got to be on. I want nothing more than to squeeze my boy. Usually Alejandro doesn't have pants on and he's doing ninja moves. He desperately wants someone to decapitate action figures with him.

I give him a big hug and many kisses. That's the best, for both of us. Then I deny his requests to play. I may make dinner, or feed Story, and put her to bed if I'm not too late. That means patting her back and singing and letting her cry. I walk out of the room for five minutes at a time as she screams. I give Ali a Popsicle, then return to pat her back some more. I hear Ali stomping towards their bedroom. "Mommy!?" His Popsicle has dripped all over his privates and the hallway, and as soon as Story hears him, she wakes up and cries louder. She's frustrated she isn't part of the violence in the living room.

It's really fun. No really, it's not.

I don't know why I expected it to be "fun." What Kool-Aid did I drink, way back when I was envisioning myself as a super chill, relaxed, loving and art-inspiring parent? And can I please have some more?

I wouldn't change anything about my life, of course. It's my design, rough edges and fuckups included. I wouldn't trade our two gorgeous babies or their amazing dad who has a creative job at which he excels (but requires him to travel)–not for anything. Or give up my job, for that matter. I love it. I love going to it, and I can't deny that.

So here I am, a modern parent.

My friend Katrina, who writes the profound workingmom'sbreak blog, told me long ago that she and her husband sometimes said to one another: "There's just not enough to go around." It's a sad state, but a good reminder to avoid the blame game between partners. It doesn't seem like enough, but it has to be.

Experienced moms tell me that it'll get much easier when the kids are in elementary school. "It's just five years away," my boss and friend Maria told me tonight. Just five years. Only a parent would be crazy enough to say that.

Only a mommy like myself would accept that decree with a bowed head. And then mourn those years' passing.