The work was solitary, but it was never isolating. Was it all meaningless? I can’t bring myself to think that it was, and is the arrival of a baby any more meaningful? All I know is that the stillness wasn’t aching before. There was more peace, there was more control, there was more independence, självständighet—the self capable of standing steady on their own. There is nobody to teach you that motherhood is forever, so how is it not a shock to your system when you find out that it is, in fact, until forever? How can this even be called motherhood?
