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A whiff of a passerby’s perfume, something simmering on the stove, or at the check in desk in a hotel lobby – what triggers your memory from scent alone?

 

You probably know that Reddit gets some of my precious free time, and I often read about scents and fragrance notes there. I love how one smell can be universal but unique to an individual. Some people smell scientifically, carefully extracting each note with precision and patience, while others are more like this smells good, it’s a winner for me (my category). Nothing like spraying on something because the description is great (and the bottle is pretty), and then realizing it’s horrific and only a shower will take it off (if you’re lucky).

Someone posed a question to me recently about scent. What scent reminds you of your mother, and are you drawn to that scent on your own?

For me, it’s Estee Lauder White Linen. I can see the bottle on the right side of the bathroom cabinet growing up. I can see my mom, delighted on Christmas morning or her birthday when she opened a carefully wrapped box containing a fresh new bottle. She had others in her rotation, too. They were lined up behind the White Linen, and everyone got a fair shot at being worn in a careful rotation. There was Shalimar, sometimes a Chanel, and as a teenager the lineup would include some of my castoffs- Ana Sui, Issey Myake, and I may have thrown in a Britney fragrance or two. My mom wore them all, but the White Linen hits hard.

 

All of those times I was sick in bed, or woke up from a bad dream in the night, my mom would sit on my bed with me and I’d smell the White Linen.

I’d never buy it and wear it myself- just not my style. It would be taking away from the memories I have, and I have no desire to create a new one. Nothing would be worse than wearing it on a first date that was a dud, to a job interview that I didn’t get a callback for, or smelling it all throughout a really bad day.

My fragrance collection has expanded these days. I’m a big fan of ScentSplit, and there are sometimes goodies at random stores. Sample sets are where it’s at for me. I do have some that I can’t wear anymore because they take me to a time or person that I don’t want to remember. I have some that, when the bottle is kicked, I’ll get a new one right away.

And mom, I’ve got a deal – you’re always first up for my leftovers if you promise me White Linen will always stay yours.

In 1977, my parents had an unorthodox (no pun intended) wedding.

Their ceremony was held at The Cathedral Church of St. John. The Cathedral, founded in 1855, was the head of Episcopal churches in Delaware. My mom is a third generation parishioner.

My father was a member of Congregation Beth Emeth, a Jewish synagogue founded in 1905. He was bar mitzvah’d there, and grew up going to services with his family.

Neither one of my parents wanted to convert, and it was important to my mom to be married at the Cathedral. They had many meetings with the Dean there, rewriting parts of a traditional Episcopal ceremony to include Jewish traditions. For example, the churchbells rang 18 times, which means “l’chaim” (to life).

My parents decided to raise their children as Episcopalians. My brother and I were both baptized and later confirmed.

I was not exposed to a lot of Judaism growing up, as my friends were Christian, and my father’s family was no longer local. In college, most of the friends I made were Jewish. I was fortunate to have been invited to their family gatherings, and I spent those years learning and celebrating Jewish holidays and customs with them.

I gave a lot of thought to religion during this time. I struggled to understand how my parents believed in two different things. In my mind, one of them had to be right and the other wrong. I wanted religion to be black and white.

I came to realize that beliefs are like love. Sometimes we are passionate, sometimes we just unconsciously accept what’s given. It doesn’t matter how each individual views love – the perspective is uniquely theirs, without the need for justification. Giving and receiving love looks different to everyone, and expressions of faith are no different.

Now I have children of my own, and in the simplest form I keep these traditions alive in my own way. We have an extended family dinner for Rosh Hashanah to celebrate the Jewish New Year, eating apples and honey for a sweet year ahead. We make hamantaschen for Purim, light the Menorah during Hanukkah, and have a seder for Passover.

My children were baptized in an Episcopal church, attended an Episcopal preschool, and look forward to pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, the Nativity at Christmas, and all the symbolism (and chocolate) at Easter.

My daughter has started to question the juxtaposition of what we are doing, just like I did. I remind her that we are really celebrating love in different ways, and faith is proof of that. I hope she is always satisfied with this answer, since love is really all you need.

This essay was originally written for Our Connections, my company’s Diversity & Belonging program, and appeared to employees in October 2023.

This week, Elise has been struggling with some homework. Reading comprehension, everyone’s favorite.

This assignment is a little different. Instead of reading, which she loves, she’s listening to someone else read the story while staring at pages of the book online. An audio book/kindle kind of mash-up, if you will.

I got her set up at my desk (she thinks it’s cool, meanwhile I can’t wait to get out of that chair at the end of the day), she fires up her laptop, and….sits. And stares. And fidgets, and bites her nails, and picks off the erasers from pencils. At first I’d gently remind her to focus in my best patient and loving mom voice.

Twenty minutes in, my tone has changed since we are both frustrated- her at this assignment and me for her not staring at a screen with words. Why can’t she just sit there? My God. She doesn’t have to even do anything.

I realized no one could do what I’m asking her to do. The average adult attention span when listening is 8-10 minutes. At the end of the day for a nine year old, I can’t even imagine that we’d be thinking in terms of minutes. Maybe like .0003 seconds?

Then came….THE QUIZ. I read her the questions out loud. She looked at me.

“What’s the answer?” she said.

“No clue, I didn’t read the book,” I replied.

“I didn’t read it either.”

She had a point. She didn’t read it.

So, I read every multiple choice answer to every question out loud. She (we?) settled on most answers by process of elimination. She (we?) checked her work. She clicked submit, and….got an 85%. Perfect! Over the threshold. One try, compared to another night this week where it took 5 tries and lots of tears.

Talking to my mom, the wizardly professor of all things Early Childhood Education, I realized why this was a struggle for Elise.

It was a passive activity, not active. She wasn’t holding a book, feeling the pages as she got deeper into the story. She wasn’t curled up on her bed in silence, and her thoughts about the plot were probably drowned out by the narrator (who had the most boring speaking voice). The few office supplies on my desk must’ve looked awfully appealing. I’d be clicking pens and pulling at Post-Its too.

We aren’t supposed to go through life passively. One of my favorite sayings is those who coast only go downhill. Messages come to us left and right, all day, to move forward.

Hit the ball! Go volunteer! Put your plate in the sink! Run for two more minutes! Make yourself a drink and a snack and get the Etch-A-Sketch for the ten minute car ride because, as soon as the seatbelts click, you’re suddenly hungry and thirsty and bored (and I’m not about to pass my cup without a lid to anyone in the back seat)!

Society is not set up for us to sit back. No one can keep up if they’re not looking in front of them. Don’t we encourage people to anticipate what’s next? It’s foreshadowing in the flesh.

Elise’s reading comprehension skills are just fine. Her listening comprehension skills under these circumstances need work. However, I’d much rather her reach for the golden ring on the carousel of life instead of snipping scissors through imaginary paper, as she sits in a chair and thinks about everything but listening to the womp womp WOMP voice (which must sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher to her).

She’s got plenty of years ahead to get ready for thirty minute lectures. I’d rather her go swing on the swingset, line up her Barbies in some convoluted but apparently extremely specific order, or draw something from her wildly creative imagination.

We all need a purpose behind what we are doing. It may not be realized until we are done, and the subconscious propeller encouraging us forward appears as a tangible reality. Without a purpose, we just hear the womp womp voices of life.

Don’t ever coast, Elise. You’ll only go downhill.

My new obsession is InstagramReality on Reddit. I am the one who can’t notice photoshopping and filters unless they’re extremely obvious (looking at you, girls, who have wavy railings behind you).

I was disenchanted recently to realize that someone I know (whose Instagram feed is always body/mentally/spiritually positive, who I respect because of her authenticity) uses a face filter. I was also disenchanted to realize that I have very few pictures of myself with my kids because I don’t like how I look in photos. The ones I am okay with have someone strategically placed in front of my stomach.

Not a secret to those close to me that I struggle with my body image, like a lot of women. I do what I consider “normal” things for a woman my age- I religiously color my hair, I have an extensive collection of shapewear, and recently got sucked into the world of researching boob tape (check it out, or don’t if you feel like passing on a rabbit hole).

I think about my body a lot- when I’m eating, when I’m having a dance party with the kids and can only concentrate on what jiggles that isn’t supposed to, when I look at the mountain of clothes on my closet floor- clothes I’ve put on and immediately taken off.

I shouldn’t be the mean girl to myself. But of course I am.

My body has been through a lot, but it’s also forty years old. Three pregnancies, three c-sections. The same 30lbs that I’ve lost and gained over and over. Surgically induced menopause. Thyroid issues, a desk job.

I’ve waxed, lasered, peeled, exfoliated, tanned (shudder, what the Hell was I thinking when I was 19???), injected.

Am I trying to filter myself without an app? Probably.

I’m not alone in any of this.

Instead of taking a dozen pictures of myself and finding one that’s just ok, I took one. It’s a few days before my hair appointment. I got caught in the rain. I do have makeup on, but it was a special occasion only a few hours before. But, it’s me, for real.

If pictures and memories are what we all will be someday, I want my children to see I wasn’t afraid of a full body snapshot. They won’t look at me one day and focus on a muffin top or a double chin. They’ll see their mom smiling because she’s with them.

There is no photoshopping happiness, or a big gulp of courage before attempting bravery and ownership of oneself. It’s not confidence. It’s making peace with yourself at some point.

I’m getting there with myself, despite the gray roots. I want children by my side instead of in front. That’s maturity and a sign of a life well lived, even if that life is thirty pounds extra.

I don’t want patronizing, empty words. I want to just know inside I’m ok with who I am.

How’s that for Instagram reality?

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We posted our news today of the closing of Hank’s Hope Inc.

Why? Lots of reasons.

Covid. It hit us hard, and we were unable to reach the community we had planned to.

Time. Single parent life isn’t conducive to working full time, keeping up with two busy kids, and preparing for uncertainties like school closings and child care arrangements and sickness. We are an all-volunteer organization (I always like to say we run on donations and love!) and our board members are in similar boats as I am.

Grief. This is the big one, and it’s personal for me.

When I organized the idea of Hank’s Hope in the spring of 2013, I was six months out from my loss. My c-section scar ached as much as my heart did. When I incorporated in 2015, I felt like I was piecing myself back together. I had a reason to say Hank’s name, every day. I had a reason to tell my story in hopes that it would reach those who had similar ones. I wanted to gather us together, and provide an opportunity for support and love.

That has been accomplished.

Hank would have been nine years old this past Saturday. We celebrated with cupcakes and candles. This year, like the past three birthdays, I had Elise and Alex to help me blow out the candles and make a wish. I always used to wish for him to be here again. But with him would mean no Elise or Alex.

My life has changed considerably since those early days. My family has grown, my heart has gotten full, and I’m looking ahead most days instead of wanting the what-ifs to come true.

In 2013 I wanted Hank’s Hope to replace my child, to give me something to nurture and grow and share. It has done that.

My grief looks different these days. When someone, fresh from loss, comes to me for help, my mind goes to telling them, “Look though! Look at all of us. I’m where you want to be, and you can get there.” No one wants to hear those words at that moment, they’re not supportive or helpful. But, that’s where my life is now, and it would be my authentic answer today.

I can’t wait for the Wave of Light next year, and am happy that Julia’s Light, an organization we’ve partnered with for the last few years, is taking charge. I will be there, helping to plan and organize. I’ll be there as Anne, not as Anne from Hank’s Hope.

October is a month where everything seems to end. The summer vacations, warm and sunny days, green leaves and grass. My grandparents both passed away during October, and so did Hank. It’s fitting that Hank’s Hope ends here too, as all of these closings are bittersweet. They’ve shaped and changed my life and the next step is to live that life, as best I can.

Saying goodbye isn’t the end of Hank. Saying goodbye means a new beginning. It’s a way for me to change the shape of my grief and how best to celebrate Hank, which was my wish when I blew out those 9th birthday candles.

THIS IS FORTY meant dropping into a yoga class with one of the best teachers I know. The mirror gave me a lovely view of all of my flaws, and all of my misses, all of the reasons why I’m a loser. I didn’t even have contacts in, a true blessing that my vision wasn’t sharper to see even more.

Not even halfway through the class, our teacher told us to stop talking shit to our reflections, and to turn around and face the wall. I didn’t realize how tightly clenched my jaw was, my back was, my emotions were until I stopped staring.

I went to bed last night, expecting to wake up to THIS IS FORTY. Instead, I woke up to my mundane life that is THIS IS THIRTY NINE but one day later. The sore muscles from sleeping on something at a funny angle, the relief I knew that would be coming by clicking on the coffee pot, the excitement in my daughters voice as she told me what the tooth fairy had left for her in the night.

It’s easy to stop at a pivotal moment, like a big birthday, and look back and see hard times, and quickly look ahead to the open hearted future that’s bright and sunny. It’s like an exclusive-to-you version of New Years Day. It’s assumed that everything in the past is something to work out of, things to get better about. Good vibes ahead and all that.

News flash, in case you are also today years old and learning this, like me. It doesn’t get better. I mean, it does in some ways. Some ways it doesn’t. If all of our THIS IS proclamations came true, we still wouldn’t be dealing with our shit. We’d also miss out on a lot of wonderful, ordinary and not so ordinary moments that make life joyful. There is no drawn line between remembering the past and leaving it all behind while forging ahead. It’s a mash up of everything, out of order.

I hate feeling heartbeats. My kids like to freak me out by grabbing my hand at random moments and placing it on their chests. They find this extremely funny and I find it extremely creepy and anxiety producing. If Mr. TDH (that’s future Mr. Tall Dark and Handsome) tells me he loves it when I rest my head on his chest, I’ll go into the maybe-we’re-not-soulmates-after-all speech.

Anyway, as we finished our yoga practice, and I was thinking about how THIS IS FORTY is really just THIS IS LIFE and a Tuesday, our teacher encouraged us to place our hands on our hearts. Normally I’d ignore this, defiantly putting my hands anywhere else.

I know my heart is broken in lots of ways and for lots of reasons. Everyone’s is. I let myself feel it beat tonight, knowing it’s been giving me life for forty years today, knowing it’s been stressed emotionally and physically, especially as of late.

I couldn’t help but cry, and it was a good moment in which to do so because when the room heated to one hundred degrees, it’s so easy to “wipe the sweat” with a towel. Highly recommend.

As Andra Day’s voice filled my ears, I gave my heart a tiny prayer of encouragement and hoped that I, too, will continue to rise up for more THIS IS days to see what ordinary chaos is created from the blurred line between nostalgia and forward-looking naive hopefulness.

THIS is forty.

I bought four scallops at Sprouts.

The remarkable part about this, if something uneventful could even be considered remarkable, is not that I bought scallops (love them) or went to Sprouts (I’m there every week), but that I ended up with four.

At the counter, I asked for “a few” scallops, the unfamiliar request sounding strange as soon as I said it. Some things we only purchase by weight and never by count, even if we have an idea of how many individual pieces we will end up with.

Scallops fall into this category.

These were wild caught, and fresh. All of these things made them much more appealing than that lonely looking chicken breast the next case over. Still expensive on sale, I rationalized that just a few is all I needed.

I cooked them tonight. I read a refresher on a brown butter sauce, made sure my pine nuts were unspoiled, clipped some sage from the yard. When it was time to reap what I sowed, I had sudden thoughts about that two pair, arranged in symmetry on my plate.

For a while I struggled with how many people there are in my family. Is Hank included or not? Are there four of us Mathays, or five? Years ago I made peace on how to answer this, and the answer is….whatever feels right at the moment.

As I unwravel my marriage, what is my number now?

The theme that we will stick to in the coming weeks when we tell the kids about us divorcing is that we will still be a family but we will live in separate houses, and not be married. A pair will split, but there still will be four. Or five. I’ve thrown a new number into the mix.

A) “Hi! I’m a single mom with two kids.”

B) “Hi! I’m a single mom with three kids, and one of them was stillborn.”

C) “Hi! I’m a single mom who has a good co-parenting relationship with my ex and we are all hunky-dory and we have three kids but one passed away so we have two that run around.”

Ummm….D? All of the above?

Family will always be fluid, which I heartbreakingly learned on October 16, 2012. All family units are the Lokis to the world, always shapeshifting, sometimes in a tricky way that can’t ever be fully explained, but only felt.

I may get more scallops tomorrow. My mom will be here, and they are her favorite. Plus, I have a lot of sage to use up and who likes turkey in July?

I’ll ask for a pound (like a normal person would). When I get home and carefully peel back the brown paper, I’ll count them.

A true count of scallops in a pound could be different each time, depending on size and density. However many I get tomorrow (and however I answer the family question) will be the right answer for that moment in time. And, that’s really all that counts.

Within the last twelve months there have been studies conducted, research gathered, subjects interviewed, charts plotted and analyzed, and plenty of firsthand introspective stories about the quagmire women find themselves in right now.

Here is my introspective, and I’m not just writing in order to publish the word quagmire.

The career mom has long been fodder for researchers. Out of the workforce to raise children, then coming back with higher heels and thicker skin to shatter ceilings. When no one is looking, she cleans up the glass because she cleans up almost everything while balancing on the beam between career and parent. She’s fascinating.

Some days, that beam feels about a half inch wide, and I’m no Simone Biles.

During the pandemic, in a five day workweek, you can find me doing morning drop offs, afternoon pickups, sports, and I’m stepping into single parent life. Everyone needs to be fed, and no one ever seems to like what I prepare. I also have a career.

I genuinely enjoy work. It’s my mental outlet, it’s a way to focus, and I can see results through action. I am challenged to think and have others who are better thinkers to guide me.

Then there is mothering, where hard work sometimes gets you a whiny cry, bickering, and several announcements during dinner declaring you so, so mean. My two little bosses at home would be shellshocked at my 360 feedback some days.

I’ve been fortunate enough to have flexability at work since the beginning of the pandemic. I log on after the kids go to bed a few nights a week so I can shuttle to karate. PTO is there when I need it, either for a sick child or a child who just needs me. I’m one of the lucky ones.

I’ll say it louder for people in the back- how are we supporting parents who never had a choice to work from home but had two children with no place to go during the day?

How will life, already precariously perched on that beam, tip next school year? Many women have been tumbling for months.

We learn from mistakes, but there are two areas where a woman just can’t fail- her career, and parenting. These two beasts are the anchors of my life, and I love them both.

America’s return to work buzz is starting, with office-based businesses large and small crafting re-entry plans. I’m sure printing shops are in overdrive, churning out masks with company logos. It makes me hopeful that most companies are returning thoughtfully and gradually.

I think returning to work is great, but where does this leave the single parent who doesn’t have a well thought out re-entry plan because there is no definitive place to actually re-enter the home side of things? What if that single working parent is a woman, who has the additional pressure of having to be good at both career and kids?

A good gymnast, like Simone, looks at her beam and takes a deep breath. She has practiced what she’s about to do thousands of times before, but there are minuscule differences in each attempt that become the variables that decide victory. She can plan for these, even anticipate them, but only until she pivots a few degrees too far left does she know whether the wobble will make the difference.

She hopes she doesn’t lose focus, fixate on a missed step that was seven steps ago, or realize in midair that her hands are positioned wrong for a landing. I’d like to think that she improvises if she has to, and does what she has to do until the end, no matter how sore and tired she is.

If Simone misses her dismount, she will still earn points for her other technical elements. But will anyone remember the hours of effort this woman has put in if she can’t make it all come together when it matters?

Ever hear a mom say that she doesn’t mind getting up four times a night for feedings, or say that she doesn’t believe in raising her voice when shit hits the fan at home? She may tell you she has THE MOM GENE. She’ll say this and you’ll nod knowingly. She loves being a mom. She LOVES IT!

Does she feel the incredible amount of societal pressure put upon us moms to proclaim that we were put on this earth to mother? Maybe. But she is letting you know that she’s great, everything is fine, it’s all under control. She has The Mom Gene, she’s made for all things parent.

I hate this, The Mom Gene. The implication is that you’re not good enough if you don’t tell people you love it, and provide examples of sacrificial acts (like getting the most amazing ice cream for yourself and trading it for a half-eaten, melted vanilla because someone spies yours and suddenly NEEDS it, and you hand it over). It also implies that those who don’t like mom things aren’t good parents.

I love my children. They love me back (pretty sure). I make the best decisions I can for them with the skills and knowledge that I have, hoping they can make good decisions when they have the opportunity to do so. All I want is for them to be happy, successful, and own homes with an in-law suite for me when I’m old.

Mom things I am not good at: Playing Barbies. Sitting on the couch and doing nothing else but watching kid TV. Playgrounds. Patience. Controlling my anxiety when I hear, “Guess what? We decided to get the paint and Sharpies out while you were in the shower, so come into the living room and sit on the new couches when you’re dressed!”

Mom things I am good at: Organizing and cleaning a room when children are actively using it. Scheduling appointments, practices, games, playdates. Reading. Cleaning paint and Sharpie off of things. Laundry. Dispensing vitamins.

I’m still a good mom even if I have no interest in participating in a complicated made-up game that combines hopscotch, tag, costume changes, and Uno cards. I’m still a good mom when I measure the days in fifteen minute increments because the thought of making it twelve hours to bedtime is overwhelming.  I’m still a good mom if I tell my child they can have a taste of my ice cream but they can finish the half eaten vanilla cone and, next time, I will help them choose something different.

My Mom Gene may be a bit different, and not just because I immediately think of high rise denim. I celebrate my parenting strengths and occasionally see opportunity in my weaknesses. It’s ok to naturally be an operational, logistical mom.  

When I feel that pressure to show The Mom Gene, I don’t pretend everything is fine, that I LOVE this all the time. There is a lot of hard work and stress mixed in with the joy of mothering. To not outwardly acknowledge how tiring this can be perpetuates the pressure to have The Mom Gene, and continues to make moms who don’t like tea parties feel inferior.

Next time you see a mom talking about The Mom Gene, pull her aside and tell her it’s ok if hers looks different. Then, get her an ice cream cone she won’t have to share.

This summer, results from bloodwork and imaging landed me in the office of a gynecologic oncologist. Let’s operate, he said. I don’t think it’s cancer, but we need to operate.

Twelve days later, I would wake up in the post-surgical recovery unit and have to be told what scenario happened while I was anesthetized. My answer was a total hysterectomy and a bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy.

When I got into bed that night (At home! Thanks, laparoscopic surgery and robotic surgery!) I mourned.

The place where I grew my babies, all four of them, was gone. The space that saw a miscarriage at 12 weeks. The space where Hank unknowingly passed away at 33 weeks. The space that, finally, got it’s shit together and figured out how to produce two living children.

The physical thread between this mother and those children was gone. Where did this leave me? I had more identity in my fertility than I realized.

In 2010, when I was newly pregnant for the first time, I read Traveling with Pomegranates: A Mother-daughter Story Novel by Ann Kidd Taylor and Sue Monk Kidd.

I learned that the pomegranate has great significance to many cultures and there are lots of references to them in religious text. It’s obviously a symbol of life and fertility due to the abundance of jeweled seeds. It is also a symbol of blood, and death.

My surgery this summer was necessary. There were too many reasons for it to take place, quickly. Is this what a pomegranate feels like once it’s peeled, with seeds gone? Is this what it’s like to let something meaningful go?

Even though there is a lot that is missing now, there is a lot that isn’t. The physical piece of me that carried my babies is gone, but so much isn’t. Like, my health.

The beauty of the pomegranate lies in the luscious, deep red arils. These babies are the prizes of life. The arils are the legacy, and the next step in the cycle. If women are peeled like the pomegranate, no longer the holder of the ruby gems but only skin around a hollow space, are we still as valuable and prized?

Yes.