Are Mini-Muffins Sexy?
by Corbin Lewars
About eight years ago I walked into one of my favorite bookstores with my toddler boy and baby girl strapped to my chest. After choosing a couple of books about bugs, we stood in line to pay. On display near the cash register was a little novelty book called something along the lines of “mommy porn.” I squealed with delight! Finally, someone is talking about moms and sex. I was quickly dismayed to see what constituted as mommy porn was a man vacuuming a rug and a man folding laundry. My heart sank and my labia shriveled. Damn, that’s not sexy, I thought. And I’m insulted that someone assumes I would think it is.
My husband at the time was probably home folding laundry at that moment and although I appreciated our equality (or somewhat equal, let’s be honest, does anyone really have an equal division of labor in their home?), it didn’t make me want to do a strip tease for him. I started thinking about our fear of combining the words “sexy” and “mother” and blogged and ranted about it for a few months. Need I remind you this was eight years ago. The term “MILF” did not exist nor did Shades of Grey. And in my Seattle neighborhood most of the moms said, “I’m too tired to think about sex or what’s sexy,” when I asked.
Then Sadie came to me. Sadie is a character in my novel Swings, not a real person, but if you’re a writer (or a mom) I assume you are quite familiar with the art of talking to yourself, your cat or made up people in your mind. So back to Sadie I went over and over again. During our eight years of conversing, what Sadie desired and what she was attracted to changed and morphed, but what remained was to be listened to and to be validated. Mothering can be lonely. It’s often a game of “tag, you’re it” and as one parent walks in the door, the other walks out. Or maybe you’re a single parent like me. And reaching out to other moms isn’t always helpful because until you find your tribe, other moms may seem judgmental, sanctimonious and as if they genuinely enjoy every blueberry smashed into their carpet and every nonsensical babble their toddler utters while you’re merely counting down the minutes until your little urchins go to bed.
During those times, we don’t need someone to tell us how to do it better, we need someone to say, “I know, it sucks. What can I do for you?” Maybe the “do for you” is a back massage, maybe it’s being brought a glass of wine, maybe it’s being listened to while you explain the ups and downs of your day, or maybe it’s all three. It doesn’t matter what it is, what matters is that you feel heard and supported. If having someone vacuum your carpet or make you mini muffins makes you feel supported and validated, then by all means ask for that. Because asking for what we want and having our desires met is very sexy.
Bio:
Corbin Lewars (www.corbinlewars.com) began writing books when she was five years old. If you count the ones that are glued and stapled she is the author of twenty-nine books. If you don’t, she is the author of three: Creating a Life: The memoir of a writer and mom in the making, which was nominated for the 2011 PNBA and Washington State book awards, the divorce guidebook Losing Him, Gaining You (2013) and novel Swings (2015). Her essays have been featured in over twenty-five publications, including Mothering, Stories with Grace, Hip Mama and several anthologies. She blogs for the Seattle PI and was the founder of the zine Reality Mom for eight years and the editor of Verve, a Seattle women’s magazine, for two. For the past fifteen years she has freelanced as a developmental editor and writing coach. She holds a Master’s in Education and teaches writing classes at national conferences. When not writing, or thinking about writing, she can be found shaking her groove thing with her two children in Seattle.