Becoming

http://polaroid41.com/becoming/

Sunday, February 14th, 2021 - 6:02pm.

I’m a big ‘birthday’ person… I love a party of course, but it’s not really about that. It’s more that I love the ritual, the marking of time passing, the taking stock. Elliot’s birthday, February 3rd, is one of my favorite days of the year. This year however, I wasn’t with him on his birthday because I was away for two weeks of residency for a new show about motherhood. The irony wasn’t lost on me! He was the whole reason I was working on such a project in the first place and yet because of the project I missed out on his birthday.

The project is a blending of documentary and live performance exploring contemporary circus artists and motherhood. These were our first two weeks together with the cast. On Elliot’s birthday I suggested an exercise where we each take 20-30 minutes to prepare and then share our ‘birth stories.’ My co-director, Lucie, said she felt like her ‘birth story’ was kind of anecdotal and that there were other times that felt more momentous. Ok, so I adjusted the request: take 20-30 minutes to prepare then tell us your birth story or the moment when you ‘met’ your child.

We all set off with our notebooks to different corners of the big beautiful theatre we were calling home for the two weeks. When we came back together we each had a story to share. I told them about the night Elliot was born. Sharing that story exactly eight years after his birth was powerful. There I was: strong and whole, missing my boy on his birthday but also knowing that I am the woman I am and the artist I am today because of him. It was incredible to look back at my tentative first steps as a mother, all of the love and pain and uncertainty of those first days, and to see how far we’ve come.

I love birth stories and doubt very much that there are any ‘anecdotal’ births. We’re talking about the arrival of a new human being on the planet! It doesn’t get much bigger than that. And yet, I loved Lucie’s suggestion...the opening of the exercise to share ‘the moment you met your child’ brought totally new layers to the exercise. That day I heard birth stories but also stories of big kids and moments when mother and child met each other anew, reconnecting after times of difficulty, navigating early adolescence.

It made me realize that while Elliot was born eight years ago, I am still becoming his mother. It’s a work in progress. We choose each other over and over, I get to meet him again and again.

The next day, Elliot hurt his knee falling off his new electric scooter on his way to school. When I called to check in in the evening he told me all about it and I was concerned, trying to gauge how much was injury and how much was attention-seeking. A little later, before bed, he was break dancing in his undies on the living room rug. (Classic Elliot.) He told papa to take a video and send it to me so I could see that his knee was all better, but he added, ‘Tell mama not to show it to anybody there.’ I was happy to see my crazy, dancing kiddo, but my heart pinched at his instructions. This was new. Elliot is such a happy, carefree boy, and he’s so comfortable in his own skin, never really thinking twice about playing in his undies or changing into his swimsuit on the beach. His instructions to ‘not show anybody’ signal a shift, a new modesty and self-awareness. I realized in that moment that I was meeting my son again. I am becoming the mother of an eight-year-old. Time is marching on. I’m here for it all.

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Find the full 'polaroid' (photo, text and minicast) at : http://polaroid41.com/becoming/