Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2001-08-21 - 6:45 p.m.

Putting Some Back

I'm returning a favor this afternoon. I have the next-door neighbor's kid playing with mine. I may give her dinner. Maybe she'll stay overnight with us again. She has a couple times in the past week or so. She's a great kid and a pleasure to have. It's also, in a way, a pleasure to be able to return this favor.

It isn't a direct return. The neighbor's marriage is coming apart at the seams. This is not a good thing, but it happens. Mine did, too, years ago.

When it did, there were women around me to feed my children. To help me peel them off my legs so I could go to the lawyers, and the marriage counselor, and the courthouse, and the mediator, and the other places you cannot take your children; all the places you need to go just when the kids need you the very most, need to believe that you won't go away too. You have to go. And there is a company of women, a rank that will close around you, so that you CAN do these things. Women who will never ask, "How long will you be gone?" or "Do you need me to give them dinner?" but simply take them and love them and care for them, until you can.

When someone does this for you, you don't want to return the favor. You don't ever want them to need you in quite that way. And perhaps they won't - but someone else will. And you will have that chance to be a safety net for another women, for another woman's child. A chance to give out extra hugs all around, and extra macaroni and cheese, and sing an extra nighttime song. And to know that we all have needs; we all have dissolving marriages, and hospitalized relatives, and other crises in our lives. You can never repay that much loving kindness directly. It's a debt you pay back into the general account, the account of women raising children and tending hearts and getting through the tougher things the best we can.

There are always places you can leave your kids, but there are only a few very special places. Places where you know your children will be family, where there will be plenty of lap space and extra chicken nuggets, and a place to sleep can always be found. Places where someone will ask them how they are feeling, and listen to them talk, and reassure them. Places where they will hear that yes, Mommy is coming back - yes, Mommy will always come back.

This week I have been given the chance to thank the women who did this for me, all those years ago. Both during my divorce and at other times when I needed it, two wonderful women have always been there for me and my children. They won't know that I thanked them this week, but I did.

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