The School for Good Mothers

by Jessamine Chan

I wanted to find one law to cover all of living, I found fear. A list of my nightmares is the map of the way out of here. —ANNE CARSON, Plainwater

The playground mothers frightened her. She couldn’t match their fervor or skill, hadn’t done enough research, stopped breastfeeding after five months when these women were still cheerfully nursing three-year-olds. She thought that becoming a mother would mean joining a community, but the mothers she’s met are as petty as newly minted sorority sisters, a self-appointed task force hewing to a maternal hard line. Women who only talk about their children bore her. She has little enthusiasm for the banal, repetitive world of toddlers but believes things will improve once Harriet goes to preschool, once they can converse. It wasn’t that Frida didn’t have ideas about child-rearing. She liked that book about French parenting, but Gust was horrified at the idea of sleep training Harriet at three months, the idea of prioritizing their adult needs. The ethos of that book was selfish.