Column for Sun Times, Tues. Mar 13

Am I Too Old For Pyjama Parties??
There are days when I worry I’ve made the wrong choice. Days when I’ve spent the morning on the phone with my friend in the city, and she is about to spend the evening at a cocktail party promoting some artist or another. She asks me - with a smirk in her voice - about the ‘small town’ thing, asks me about the snow and the shovelling and terrible white cocoon that has overtaken my little home (and proceeds to tell me that she has been wandering the streets in ballet flats for a month). Asks me when I’m going to get over it and come back already. Because she can’t quite believe that I’m willing to live this tiny boring life when she knows something better for me is probably just around the corner.
This is my problem, I think. I’m always waiting for something fantastic to happen to me around the corner. Always looking so far ahead to where I maybe should be and not seeing where I really am. I wonder if it’s like this for a lot of people who have moved back home to a small town. There’s always so much going on in the city, so many blinking lights and 50% off sales. I missed it yesterday. If I were back, I thought wistfully, I would head to the huge book store. I could spend an entire afternoon in a hidden corner with books I hadn’t bought and a cappucino that cost me $4 - and no one would see me. I missed not being seen.
Which is why living in a small town sometimes feels wrong to me. People see me all the time, and I must tell you that I put as little effort as possible into my appearance at the best of times. One of these days, I should really try to slap on some lipstick before I hit the grocery store, so that I’m not taken by surprise by the 15 people I see while picking through the banana pile in dirty sweats. It’s noticed when I drop the boys off at school in my pyjamas (and it’s really noticed when I’m screaming ‘don’t forget your snow pants, Nathan!’ after my son), it’s noticed when I forget to mow my lawn or get my van stuck in a snow bank for the millionth time. People see my small, sometimes crazy life for all it is, laid mostly bare, and there are days when I am made so vulnerable by this that I am ready to pack it up and go back to being no one.
But last night there was a pyjama party at Dufferin School. We were celebrating Literacy Week (which my sons were shockingly excited about) and their fantastic Principal, Dan Russell, was heading up a party to celebrate the bedtime story between 7 and 8. Everyone wore their pyjamas, even the parents (except for a few party poopers - they know who they are). The Principal even wore these terrible one-piece baby blue footed pyjamas with his tie - and a straight face, if you can believe it. He’s just fabulous. The gymnasium floor was covered in mats for parents to cozy up to their children, with bins full of books to read. There wasn’t a whole lot of fanfare, just some good old-fashioned reading, some milk and cookies and singing along to Robert Munsch. Would we have done this in the city? I can’t help but wonder. There was always something going on at their old school too, but there would be such a crush of bodies clamouring for space with heated cheeks and migraines that I avoided after school activities unless absolutely necessary .
Here, though, at this little school with real trees and long lawns and teachers who love their jobs, it’s all about small joys. The joy of having your sons and their friends cuddle up on the mat beside you while the Principal reads to them from his rocking chair. The joy of having this special little party just because it’s a Wednesday, really. Parents volunteer out of desire instead of choice. Families stand in the school yard, long after the last bell has rung, and talk about their day, their kids, their lives. Because as much as my life is laid bare before them, they are willing to lay their lives bare for you. Sure, they know that you struggle and complain and nag your kids, but at the end of the day, it feels like this little school is gunning for you. Gunning for your kids. Gunning for each other. Because we’re all we’ve got. They remind me of why I came back, why I am staying, and why I still really love being a Mom. Keep it up.