Mommy Brain

Sometimes I feel like I lose out on a lot of intellectual stimulation being a stay at home mom. I mean, seriously, playing blocks and tickling kids doesn't amount to a whole lot of smarts. The fact that I can rattle off the tv schedule for PBS in the morning is not something that I am proud of, nor the fact that the majority of my education these days is confined to learning bits of Spanish and Mandarin from Nickelodeon.

I like learning. I love the fact that you can open a book and learn something new each time. I love libraries and bookstores and places of education. I love that the internet is brimming over with knowledge just waiting to be gleaned from. I get excited about the prospect of taking my kids to museums and aquariums. I peruse the adult school catalogs each season looking for classes I could potentially take when the opportunity arises.

Funny thing though...I wasn't a very good student. I usually do better when the learning comes of my own volition rather than on a forced schedule. So in my classes I always averaged out because I couldn't keep up with the school work or mentally handle that timeline on my syllabi. So time was never my thing, but in all honesty, I still have most of my college textbooks, and I still use them. I like to read them every once in a while for no other reason than the information fascinates me. Yup, kind of nerdy, huh?

Perhaps that's why I liked teaching. It was an opportunity to always learn, to find new things to pass on to my students. It was an opportunity to study up on teaching theories and child development. It gave me an excuse to read odd books just to have a wealth of knowledge to entertain my students.

So that explains my need to read half of the parenting books in existence when I found out we were expecting the first time around. It also explains why I reread some of the more pertinent ones the second time around. There's also the horrendous pile of books by my bedside and the hundreds of feeds flying into my Google Reader each day. It makes me feel like I'm not letting my brain turn to mush as I pretend I have no idea how to put together that 5-piece puzzle my daughter wants me to help her with.

Then again, I do love that look of accomplishment on Bear's face after she figures out that puzzle, and I'll take that over being smart any day.