Originally written in 2020

I took the kids to the park yesterday and was looking forward to just checking out on my phone while they played. And then, 10 minutes after arriving, I was spotted by someone I had worked with years ago. As it turns out, she lives not far from me, and had met with some of her friends so their kids could have a park playdate. After the initial hugs and hellos, I found myself being ushered over to meet her friends, and I was immediately enfolded into this mom group of other women.

It was such funny experience. Not funny ha-ha, but funny as in, I was very aware of what I was thinking and experiencing in the moment. Talking to these lovely women, I was friendly. I was witty, I was saying snappy things and making them laugh. I knew I was an interloper in this little clique, and I pulled out all of the stops so that they wouldn’t regret tolerating my presence. I was, to use an antiquated term, charming.

And as I was standing there, chatting and joking about juice boxes and laughing at the phrase “purse wine” (it’s a thing – if you know you know), a part of my brain was standing back the entire time. That part of me was observing how carefully I acted, how mindfully I chose my level of snark (I judged it safe to call my kids jerks, from the knowing chuckles that were elicited; a bit riskier with this crowd to use the word “fuckery” when describing my kids’ shenanigans). That other part of me was watching me watch these ladies, while I was also charming them, and thinking: “You girls don’t even know I went to bed at 4 PM yesterday because I felt so tired and weighed down by just, life.”

So funny. We can all be so charming when called upon. You would never know.

A little while later, still talking with my former coworker, we were discussing what childrearing was like for each of us. My friend is a nervous giggler, and as we chatted, she kept punctuating her sentences with these little laughs. She began to tell me about her 8-year-old son and the medical complications he had been going through – how he had to have three quarters of his bowel removed right after he was born, and they have always had a pediatric GI, and how recently they found that he had an infection that is most commonly seen in 3rd world countries, and he had to have a colonoscopy – at eight! – and is on some medication for 30 days and if it doesn’t clear up, it could lead to cancer or ulcers down the road. All of this heavy news tumbled out of her, a waterfall of words, broken up by these giggles as she chatted with me, someone she just happened to bump into at the park.

Walking home later, I thought about my friend and her nervous laughter – the way it felt like a protection, a reassurance to her listener that although she was describing struggles, it was okay – it wasn’t so bad. No big deal. I wondered if she felt like she couldn’t describe the things that were hard for her unless she made sure to laugh.

It made me think that everyone is walking around with the weight of everything on them at any given time. And then, like my friend, we hint at it in casual conversation, or talk about it in a way that shows it’s not really such a big deal. But I think about the things my friend didn’t say. There must have been so much worry. Sleepless nights. Anxiety before doctor appointments. The undercurrent of watchfulness, developed from the very beginning when her son had his surgery as an infant, now augmented as he gets older. The projection toward the future, hopefully cancer- and ulcer-free. All hidden there in those nervous laughs.

She and I weren’t so different. As she and I talked, she was probably watching herself watch me. Gauging my reactions and modulating her responses. Just like I did earlier with her friends, in my effort to be charming, to hide my exhaustion.

It’s amazing that we ever actually get to know anybody, really. We’re all so busy carrying that stuff, that weight, around. But, while we’re carrying it, we’re also so busy smoothing it, hiding it, lessening it for public consumption. Amazing that we can get past it to truly let anyone see us.

I guess that’s what true intimacy is. When you let someone see the true weight that you happen to be carrying that day.