As any mother of small children will tell you, there’s never much time to be alone. And regardless of your profession or work status, mothering is a full-time position. I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t overwhelming. Some days it’s overwhelmingly full of big joy and laughter and other days it looks more like me barely keeping it all together, summoning all the patience I can manage to make it work. Luckily I have a lot of help.

Tonight however, I found myself coming home to an empty house. No responsibilities awaited me. Like a giddy teenager whose parents had left for the weekend, I felt liberated.

I love being a mother but oh, this small solitude was sweet.

So I took a long run through the neighborhood I grew up in and remembered the last time I had run those same paths, nearly 8 years (and about five lifetimes) ago. I sat in the grass, barefoot and sweating, to watch the rolling summer thunderstorms come in. I didn’t judge myself, didn’t feel guilty and didn’t cross anything off my to-do list.

Tomorrow I’ll drive to work and go back to being mama but for tonight, for really the first time since I had Lucia, I’ll be still and quiet and just me.