As the old saying goes, “Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder” and boy-howdy were we reminded of this recently. For a couple weeks we found ourselves living the life of single mothers. We will be the first to admit, we just aren’t tough enough for that job. I think in the first couple of days our Super Hero capes were still neatly pressed and gleaming because “By golly if we can birth a child, we can do ANYTHING!” By day four or five the glam starts to wear off and the grumbling sets in and by the second week, we were just plain fit to be tied. Sure, our houses were an absolute pig sty but hey, the kids were still alive and that’s gotta be worth something.
The range of emotions you go through when flying solo is quite hysterical and often from one extreme to the other. There is the sense of feeling accomplished for being able to shower, feed, transport and entertain your little ones all the while you are juggling household duties, remembering to feed the dog, keeping up on laundry…oh and that little “side” job called real estate. There’s also the sense of exhaustion, frustration, and straight up defeat…..never mind the sense of failure for forgetting about the Pumpkin Patch field trip that snaps you right back into reality.
It is amazing how accustomed we can get to always having our partners by our side. The little things that help us in such immeasurable ways like loading the kids in the car for school, tackling Costco on a weekend with the kids (seriously, who in their right mind does that?), getting to swim lessons on time AND remembering their swimsuits or simply placing the recycle bin on the curb. Heck, one of our husbands (who shall remain nameless for fear it would jeopardize his reputation) may even have visited the MAC counter at Macy’s because he knew mama was out of her favorite face product and couldn’t break away to get a refill herself. The drive to Macy’s wasn’t the kindness; it was noticing the empty bottle, having the forethought to realize it was likely a specific color and then taking in the empty bottle to be sure it was the right match….all the while schlepping the chubbiest, immobile 11 month old.
It is easy to take these things for granted until you are left to do them on your own. I won’t lie, having my husband immersed in a two week investigation made me grumpy at times but it also made me extremely proud. I was proud of him for being a contributing member of society, knowing he was working around the clock alongside countless others to bring justice to the victim. Despite the ignorant commentaries circulating the internet and news about the lack of competence among our local law enforcement agencies, he pressed on until the suspects were in custody. I was also proud of him for finding a way to see his son on his second birthday so he could give him a hug, even if it was in a parking lot down the street from the crime scene and only lasted a whole five minutes. He stumbled in at the wee hours of the morning, long enough to change his clothes and get a quick shower and head back out while we all slept. There wasn’t a day that went by when he didn’t thank me for the sacrifices I was making so he could keep his focus. Nor did a day pass that his boys didn’t know he was thinking about them and as soon as they caught the “bad guys” he would come home and ride bikes with them.
Raising children has its challenges as does being married to police officers but without question, we are the first to admit it takes a special breed to be married to women like us. We are stubborn and tenacious, perhaps a bit on the control-freak side and all topped off with a dash of sensitivity. We often talk about our village of people who make what we do possible and without them we certainly couldn’t accomplish what we do. But moments like these remind us that real estate is what we do, it’s not who we are. We are wives and we are mothers and this is what brings joy to our hearts. We feel blessed beyond measure to be sharing our lives with such supportive and understanding husbands who make it possible to excel at what we do. Sure, our real estate careers are blessed and we have incredible clients who value the service we provide but our greatest accomplishment to date is to have children who think we are the “best-est,” husbands who are proud to be our partners and marriages that survived their first decade and then some.
