Excavation [Ellie]

Subject: The recovery of the missing identity of a Caucasian female of child-bearing age, hair light brown, eyes hazel, height 5’2”, weight unlisted.

On my Christmas list this year were: a food processor, a dressy jacket, a blender, a CD of the opera Carmen, and a storage ottoman that was to act as a more attractive toy box. Mostly mommy gifts. What I opened on Christmas morning from Bryan? A laptop. A tiny, zippy purple one. And with the laptop a gift certificate to Caribou Coffee and four hours of free time to write.

Surprised hardly covers what I felt. I was barely aware of the tears that slipped down my cheeks as I contemplated why on earth he’d bought me something so extravagant—so beyond our typical gift-giving protocols. Because we buy gifts in hope, I knew the laptop reflected how he saw me, or more accurately, how he would like me to be; how I was when we met.

We’ve been talking a lot about who I am or should be or once was lately. With our last child (according to the current plan) turning one next month, my days as a full-time stay-at-home mom are winding down. I never thought it would seem so brief. We’ve been teasing the kids that Mommy is trying (again) to decide what she wants to be when she grows up.

It seems that the question now facing me is, do I return to who I was before children, as if this period of my life were just a blip in a smooth forward trajectory, or do I begin from scratch to create a new Ellie? Not that three decades of memories and baggage make it easy to start from scratch. Do I resume life as a middle-aged middle school teacher? Do I again take up the role of English major? Or is there something other and never-before-considered that will make me truly happy? (Is the search for one-true-job as quixotic a pursuit as seeking one-true-love?) Do I even want to pursue a career, or do I just want a job that will bring in a little extra income to support my real vocation of mother? In the same position I was in at the end of high school, I feel less certain of the answers now than I did then. I think, in general, that feeling less certainty—about everything—is the change these past sixteen years have wrought on my life.

I know that Bryan would like this zippy purple laptop to perform an excavation. He would like it to dig out the overachieving, intense, virginal English major he fell in love with. There are parts of her I too would love to recover. I’d like to recover her vocabulary, for instance. During my parents’ last visit I had to be reminded that adults don’t refer to it as “going potty.” Yet there are many parts of her I am happy to have left behind. I’m happy to say that her door-slamming tantrums and utter self-centeredness are largely a thing of the past. Still, I’m stuck looking back while trying to foretell what will bring me happiness in the future when all I really want to do most days is survive the present.

Would anyone like to tell me what I should do with this purple laptop and the rest of my life ahead of me?