Being a grown up means a lot. Being able to drink, obviously. Possibly having a home, a family, a secure job and way to support yourself…

But most of all, being a grown up means just being able to be YOURSELF. 

The way that I’m talking, you’d think I just turned 21, or 25, or even 30… instead of being a 34 year old mother of two. But even back then, at 21, or 25, or 30, I hadn’t really felt like a true, comfortable-in-my-skin grown up. But now? Two kids, almost 5 years into mostly wedded bliss, a home that is ours (take it or leave it), and a group of friends that we adore… I feel like I’m finally where I’m supposed to be.

So where did all this weepy, mushy squishy nostalgia come from?

The stomach flu.

Seriously.

The Peanut and I have had a doozy of a week together, with her passing the gloriousness of the stomach flu to me after dealing with HER for two straight days… When I say that I’ve never experienced motherhood this way before? I mean it. Picture being covered in barf, in a BANK. Like a LOT of barf, in a bank with actual people in it, all of whom are looking on in horror at your own little Linda Blair. I would not have been shocked if her head had spun around or she started levitating out of my arms.

So it was kind of inevitable that I would get it. Because I just don’t think there’s anyway possible to be physically touching puke and not get the stomach flu. Are you totally grossed out yet? Because that’s kind of what I’m going for.

So I got it. But for the first time since I married the husband, he was on a trip and I was alone with both kids.

Alone and barfing with both kids.

Let’s pause for a moment to let that sink in.

Yup. It was about as bad as it sounds.

But you do what you have to do and Aladdin, Mr. Incredible and Daniel Tiger were the parents that day. I merely survived, throwing food at the kids when they got hungry and putting them down for naps when they (read: I) got tired.

And I survived with the help of the amazing friends that I have found since I became a real grown up.

Friends that I jumped in with both feet to meet when we moved here. Friends that I have cried to, gotten drunk with, acted like a complete buffoon with. Friends that finally love me the same way that I adore them.

And these same friends showed up at my house and left soup and crackers and ginger ale on my front step. These friends took the Big Kid, when he was DONE with my sorry ass and fed him dinner and entertained him. These friends came over, germs be damned(!) and played with my kids while I looked weakly on from the couch. Such wonderful amazing friends.

And for the first time, when the husband got home from his trip that night, I got a little weepy thinking about how I had finally found them. How I had stopped chasing after friends, stopped wishing that I was part of a group, stopped wondering when I was going to find my tribe. How I stopped acting like I had for so many years when I was younger, and not so comfortable in my own body and my own life, how I aspired to those kinds of friends but rarely found them.

They are here. Taking care of me. Making me feel like the most loved person in the world.

Somedays it’s good to be a grown up.

And there’s also the wine thing too… being a grown up is good for that.