you and me and everyone else

As Gabriel (also known as G-Force) and I left a sweet Halloween party with friends from his school this morning, he suddenly looked down at the paper bag festooned with an orange construction paper pumpkin clutched in his hand and said, "Mama! We don't have one for Didi!"

I told him that since his big sister didn't come to this party, she doesn't get a party favor. This one was just for Gabriel. His eyes narrowed in thought as he opened the bag and contemplated its contents: mini chocolate bars, Halloween-themed stickers, plastic spider rings ... in short, treasure. Standing there on the sidewalk peering into the little bag, he became more and more concerned, until the dark clouds lifted from his face all at once and he looked up at me, exclaiming "I know!! I can share the candy with Didi when we get her after school!"

Problem solved. Gabriel finds it very hard to enjoy anything special until he is reassured that every member of his family will be able to enjoy it with him, especially his big sister (this is definitely not always the case with other children). It's akin to how babies who are new to holding and munching food will take a few bites, notice that you are tragically lacking something to gnaw, then grin and offer you their mushy, decimated teething biscuit. It just doesn't taste as good when you eat it by yourself.

Now I know this flies in the face of so much toddler (and adult!) behavior, but counterexamples to the abundant moments of greed and grubbiness that threaten to dominate our vision of what children are like strike me as important to notice. It feels better to enjoy blessings in community. Kids know it, and we do too.

A dear friend asked me recently why I persist in thinking my eventual return to full time social work must directly involve the lives of vulnerable people. Why not do something more creative, more supported, less likely to lead to burn out? Is it some bizarre pathology, am I just a guilt-ridden caregiver? That kind of thing might come into play, but I heard myself say instead that my fate was tied up with the fate of everyone in my community, especially the poor. My well-being is tied to the well-being of people I don't know, people I might never know. I cannot conceive of my flourishing as an independent process.

It's not that I'm particularly good. It's just that when I've worked with poor people, I have understood my life as connected and meaningful. Not that it isn't now. Taking care of babies and young children is living in a state of uber-connection! But it's an inward-looking time, and as my children grow older and more independent, I find myself looking outward direction more often, wondering about all the people in this town that I drive by on the way to school and Whole Foods and Halloween parties.  

The question for me these days is how I want to be a social worker again: doctoral program or grassroots advocacy? Figuring out the path ahead (which I may not actually set foot upon for a very long time) is also about recalibrating the shifting balance in my life of inward and outward, family and community, giving and receiving. (Throw in the mix that fact that I am also trying and failing to quiet irrational dreams of a third baby in the midst of all this reflection on what is important for me to do as a social worker. Conflicting desires, my friends! I suffer a comically persistent case of conflicting desires.)

When we picked up Frances, there was a small farmers market operating in the parking lot. She discovered there was a big jar of candy on offer, and darted between grown ups to fetch two purple boxes of Nerds, one for her and one for her brother. Then Gabriel passed her his bag of treats from the morning. It was a fine, happy rainy afternoon. We begin with our families, and that is as it should be. But when is it time to reach out beyond this safe and loving place, and risk offering our treasures to a stranger?