Mom in the Mirror

Thursday in the Emergency Room

Around 3:30 p.m., Colter decided he could have died today.

He curled up on my lap and remembered back a few hours, to when he and Gary were on their way to school and an older woman rear-ended their car.

Colter remembered the moment of impact -- the car lifting and bouncing down.

He remembered yelling and crying and saying his head and neck hurt.

He decided that he would have been hurt worse if he hadn't been:

• wearing his seat belt
• sitting in the middle of the back seat
• playing his Game Boy

When he looks back on today, he will remember the EMTs who checked him out and the ambulance Gary called then decided wasn't necessary.

He'll remember the female police officer with the 11-year-old daughter who was so helpful when the cop fell this morning that she thinks her girl will become a nurse.

He'll remember the emergency room, buying Skittles while we waited, wearing a hospital gown for the first time, being given a red bracelet with his allergy noted (Penicillin), getting X-rays, watching Tom and Jerry cartoons.

And he'll remember that we were there, holding him, hugging him, making him laugh.

He'll remember the love. And he'll feel thankful.

If you had one wish...

Last night Colter asked me, "If you had one wish, what would it be?" He's asked me this before, and each time my answer is the same, "I'd wish for you to live a happy and healthy life until the day you die."

I'm not sure whether he keeps asking because he's hoping for a different answer or because my response -- and its consistency -- reassures him.

What would you wish?

The birthday seder

Colter turns 9 years old today. And each year on his birthday, we enjoy certain rituals. (Actually, some rituals he enjoys, others he tolerates.)

Just as we will celebrate Passover this weekend by following the same ceremonial order we always do, so too will we follow an order today.

In the morning, Colter opens the gifts that came from far away. He searches the envelopes for cash, check or gift card. Then, he reads the messages. Finally, he unwraps presents.

He measures himself against me to see how tall he's grown (this year the joke is that I'm shrinking, since the chiropractor told me last week that I'm 5 foot 3 and a half inches instead of 5 foot 4, and we don't know whether previous estimates were rounded up or taken with my shoes on or whether I'm truly losing height).

We talk about all the ways he's matured since his last birthday.

And he is forced to listen -- every year -- to the story of his birth in detail. Also, around 5:09 p.m. when he was born, we go through his baby book and I remind him of how much he weighed at birth and we look at pictures from his first year.

Later in the day, we eat dessert and he opens the gifts we've given him, saving the biggest for last.

The unanticipated event this year is that Colter woke with a fever, threw up, and won't be going to school with cupcakes, as planned. So, we'll be home together instead, where I can kiss his forehead, huggle with him, and celebrate his existence. Next year, in good health.

What are your birthday traditions?

Wanna huggle?

Colter and I were hugging and cuddling one morning last weekend, when I suddenly realized, "We're huggling!"

The combination of "hug" and "cuddle" created a word that suited us perfectly, and that we've used almost every day since.

Every family has its own language.

Describe yours.

Live and let dye

I spent some time last week with a very good friend. We hadn't seen each other in several years, and while we were together I was struck by our superficial differences.

I don't dye my hair, pluck, tweeze, wax or wear makeup. I let my age and experience show. This philosophy is a combination of self-acceptance and laziness.

My friend dyes, plucks, tweezes, waxes and wears very natural makeup. Her philosophy is a combination of self-care and fastidiousness.

I wonder: how can two women who seem so different be so close?

I know: we are more than our differences and more than what we share in common. We love and respect each other for our perfectionism and our imperfections. We are friends and have been since we met at work nine years ago when I was pregnant with my son and she was soon pregnant with her first daughter. We survived childbirth, breastfeeding, mini-milestones and more together. We celebrated holidays and mourned deaths. We know each other well beyond appearances.

But what about all the other women who are less familiar to me, who I know by name or face or not at all? All the women I pass in my car, in the hall, down the aisle, who are not me?

One of the not-so-secret facts of life as a woman is that we judge each other.

Constantly.

About everything.

You cook, I don't. You drive a mini-van, I drive a sedan. You shop, I read.

And beneath these differences are deeper ones.

You stay at home, I work. You live in the suburbs, I'm a city girl. I have one child, you have several or none at all. You're single, married, divorced, gay.

We are years beyond the swimsuit competition, and no one can win the lifestyle competition.

In a world of glass houses and glass ceilings, women shouldn't throw stones. We just might hit ourselves.

We have to learn to co-exist, to understand that we each have choices to make, different from everyone else's choices, however similar they may seem.

It has to be OK for me to be vintage and you to be Valentino, for me to have a wild child while yours is Miss Manners, for both of us to balance our privacy with living in public.

Otherwise, we are being judged by a jury of our peers and found guilty. More guilty than we already feel about our necessarily imperfect choices in this imperfect world.

Like our forefathers, we must grant each other the right to the pursuit of happiness, wherever that leads us.

Because if we cannot feel free to be ourselves, who can we be?

In a world full of sound and fury signifying nothing, we must choose lives that fill us with peace, signifying everything. That peace comes from acceptance -- a gift we can give ourselves and each other.

And when we have that, who cares whether our hair is stray, flyaway or gray?

This LifeFiles column originally appeared on about 70 TV station websites managed by Internet Broadcasting Systems.