Rush Hour
By Adrienne Garrison
@adrie.garrison
Memory is a trickster and a weaver of spells. It fails and falters, misleads and enchants us. In the end it’s all we have, our most precious belonging. But in the daily commute—that long stretch of highway in the middle when moments unfold—we are in the stop-and-go traffic of life itself.
And the story is still being written.
***
To Danny, our newlywed stretch in Chicago felt like gridlock: long days in anatomy lectures, gloomy walks home from the Metra, and studying late into the evening day after day. There was an ever-present feeling that failure was nipping at his heels, and that the dream of becoming a doctor was hanging in the balance every time he sat down for an exam. Sure, he recalls the celebratory six-packs he shared on the train with his classmates, and the thrill of trying out a new restaurant that we just saw featured on Food Network. But mostly, if you asked him what he remembered, he would talk to you about grey skies, grey buildings, and the maddening red of brakelights in rush hour traffic. To him, that entire chapter of our lives felt like 5:30 p.m. on the Dan Ryan Expressway. The best part was when it ended and he could finally move on.
My version of those years would read more like a fairytale. At twenty-two, it seemed like the city was unfurling at my feet. We found the perfect apartment, I got a job that I loved, and for four years—from Lincoln Square to Bronzeville, The Green Mill to Second City—the thrill of discovery never faded. Chicago got under my skin in the best way, graphing a street map onto my mental pathways. Everytime I found a shortcut, discovered a new neighborhood, or managed to slip between the doors of the Brown Line just moments before they closed, I felt like I was winning.
Of course, there was the constant job uncertainty, the sense that everything important was still ahead of me, the stress of making rent while people I graduated high school with posted selfies at the Eiffel Tower. There was real and excruciating self-doubt and desperately waiting to be noticed by prospective employers and prospective BFFs. There were way too many nights spent waiting for my husband to look up from his textbook and notice me. But those hardships have faded away, and when I remember that chapter of our lives, I think of laying on a picnic blanket for a summer concert at Pritzker, watching the city flicker and glow to life as the sun dipped below the skyline. I think of bike rides along the lake and Cubs games and parallel parking like a boss.
So, if a twenty-something wanted to have a conversation about hard knocks, they’d be better off talking to Danny. As far as I’m concerned, they should savor every moment—sleeping past ten, brunch on Sundays, long afternoons to fill with absolutely anything they like.
Don’t they know how good they have it?
***
I must have been looking particularly frazzled as I navigated parks and pool decks with my three kids this summer, because I attracted the notice of several well-meaning, slightly older mom-friends who, one after the other, stopped to tell me just how much they missed the little years. They held me by the arm, looked me in the eye, and told me that it seemed like just yesterday they were packing their kindergartner’s lunch for their first day of school or hauling all their kids to the library for storytime.
“It goes so fast,” they say. “It’s unbelievable.”
And it is unbelievable.
Like, frankly, I do not believe them. Because if I were to write this chapter right now, I would not omit potty training, Hand, Foot, and Mouth disease; or stepping on Legos. I will never forget the haze of understimulation and overwhelmedness that has descended on me, frequently and unpredictably, for the last nine years. Or the challenge of thinking coherently with the Paw Patrol theme song in the background while making three separate dinner options for three separate children, none of which include vegetables.
These truths do not in any way diminish the unparalleled delight of a child sleeping on my chest. I will gladly endure these hardships if it means being the one they run to—with their joys, their fears, and every new creation they insist I come see RIGHT NOW!
Anyone who knows me knows that I am truly doing everything I can to be present in these moments. I am tuning my heart, my time, and my art to the frequency of their childhood. I am here. For all of it.
So when they tell me it goes so fast, I want to remind them that it also feels grueling, like moving at a snail’s pace through rush hour traffic. Every red light brings another round of dishes, tantrums, or relentless demands.
The truth is, when are past this stage, a big part of me will feel relieved and grateful to have finally arrived—safe and relatively sound.
***
Between my version and Danny’s, the story of our Chicago years is told in a way that captures everything. The highs, the lows, the mundane middle. I say it was pure magic, Dan says it was kind of miserable, and we’re both right. I’m starting to understand that memories of parenting in the little years work in a similar way. It’s never the fathers of teens and tweens getting misty-eyed as they reminisce about life with a toddler.
When this phase is over, I know I will miss what I can’t recover. I’ll miss being the sun around which they orbit, and having the power to heal with a kiss. I’ll miss their hand in mine, their thoughts flowing from their mouths uninhibited and unfiltered. I’ll miss the overwhelming preciousness of their round cheeks and wide eyes, their baby soft skin and silky brown curls.
Sometimes, I may even look back on the moments when I felt so much pressure I thought I would break into a million jagged pieces … and I’ll miss those, too. The little years are a glorious thing, and I’m so lucky to be right in the thick of them—even when it feels like we’re going nowhere fast.
That’s why, the next time Dan and I get home five minutes early from our monthly date night, I’ll resist the urge to wax poetic about my golden Chicago years to the babysitter. I’ll let that girl go home a little bit early with a tip that might just buy her a drink later that same night, when I will be sleeping the extravagant sleep of a woman who no longer takes it for granted.
And when the little years are in my rearview mirror and I pass a mom in the absolute thick of it, I’ll tell her she’s making it look easy—that these good, hard moments are adding up to a beautiful story. I’ll tell her that, looking back, the trials are a blur, but the best moments never leave you.
They make you who you are.
Adrienne Garrison lives in Bloomington, Indiana with her husband and their three little ones. Her essays have appeared in Coffee + Crumbs and New Millennium Writings, and her short story “No Longer Mine” was recently featured in LETTERS Journal. Adrienne believes magic takes the form of heart-to-heart conversations, petit-fours, and walks in the woods. You can find more of her writing on her website and Substack.
Photo by Jennifer Floyd.