I've Been Thinking

Our first apartment in Des Moines, Iowa. My first time I had ever lived outside of my home state of Utah. I was scared. Alone. Afraid. I found out soon that I had great neighbors. One of them being, Sarah.

Sarah and I were two of the most opposite people in the world...according to our lifestyles. She loved "clubbing it", working it with different guys, and a myraid of different things that I didn't even know existed.

We became great friends. I still miss her and think of her often.
There is one thing we never agreed on. It drove her crazy that I hated being away from my kids. She would frequently get frustrated with me and ask in exhaustion, "What if something happens to you and you can't take care of your kids anymore?" "Your kids aren't going to know anybody else if you are the only one that ever takes care of them!"

Yes, Sarah. You are exactly right. It didn't matter. She never did persuade me to her way of thinking.
My response.
That is exactly the point. If anything ever happens to me, I want my kids to know that I spent every possible moment with them. I want them to know my kisses as well as they know their name. I want them to know my smell. The way I roll out cookie dough. The way I wipe their bum and the way I sing them to sleep. I want them to remember that no matter what happens in this life, their mother loved them more than anything in this world...and that nothing...nothing, would come between my children knowing that their mother loved them. I want them to know my laugh. Especailly when they do something naughty. I want them to remember that I loved their dad. I want them to know my cry. I want them to know that some of those tears were shed for them.
I want to be the one they come to when they get their feelings hurt. I want to be the one who sees their smiles and their tears, even if I am the cause. I want to take them to their doctor appointments and hold them down for their shots. I want to be the first person they see after school and ask them what they learned...and if of course, they missed me as much as I missed them. I want to be the one to smile when they come down the stairs dressed for school in their swimming trunks in the middle of winter.
We never did concede to each others way of thinking. And sometimes, those are the greatest friendships of all. To disagree, agreeably.