I wasn’t suffering from the “MUNDAYS” or anything, in fact, I actually was feeling pretty good. Until I went to drop Ethan off at his pre-school, and he didn’t want to go into his classroom.

When I went into his room this morning to wake him up, he didn’t get up right away (he usually does). I had to go in a second time and turn his light on and make sure he was getting up. He is usually very excited to get out of bed, visit the bathroom and get dressed all by himself (a recent accomplishment is the ability to snap his own jeans, which at one point, he showed to each person in turn at yesterday’s soiree). So I was a little worried that something was wrong, but he seemed fine and his usual boisterous self after he got over the initial sleepiness. He didn’t seem to be that hungry though, and only ate about 1/4 of his morning bagel. He seemed fine walking in to school, but when we got to the actual door to his class, he wouldn’t walk in. I pulled/carried him in, and sat with him in a snuggle, but I didn’t want to draw out the inevitable departure. He didn’t bawl, but there was a few tears shed. When I left, he had gotten out his naptime blanket and was huddled up in it, ignoring his teacher’s attempts to engage him.

My morning commute was lengthened due to an accident that blocked one lane of traffic. I didn’t get in until 8:30, a half hour later than usual. I think of this as an additional half hour that I worried about my poor little son, berated myself for being a bad mother who is working instead of staying home with him and his sister, and decided that I was ruining his life forever. I got to work and promptly called his school (I had forgotten my cell phone, or I’d have called on the drive in) to hear that he was doing fine.

I always say that I wish my kids would just stay this age forever, and of course in a way I do because they’re small and just cuter than big-eyed kittens in baskets hugging the Snuggly teddy bear on top of sleeping long-eared puppies. WAY CUTER. But a part of me dreads them growing up because parenthood at this stage has got to be so much easier than parenthood to older kids with actual problems and concerns. Right now, I can hug them away any tears and kiss their boo-boos and help them get through being scared of the dark, and let them “DO IT MYSELF MOMMY!” and show them their letters and what sounds they make. It still kills me at times like today, when I wish I had never HEARD of going back to work, just so I could stay with my boy and hold him. But surely even this will be easier than what is ahead. I don’t know how I’m going to be able to help them with fights with friends, problems with school or teachers, having the wrong sort of friends, storming off to their rooms with slammed doors and huffy silences.

Motherhood is hard right now, but I know how to be a mother to toddlers. I don’t know how good a mother I will be to older kids, or dread the day, pre-teen and beyond.

So, yeah. Mondays suck.

I’ll write more on my weekend later.