I wasn't planning to make a friend the day I met Claire.* From the mess of my kitchen, I'd read the newspaper notice of a playgroup at the library for new mothers and babies. I looked over at Ezekiel as he dropped slices of warm zucchini over the edge of his high chair. I grabbed him, got us dressed, and headed out of the house.

In the basement of the local library, the mothers sat on carpet squares in tidy clusters as the toddlers circled the board books and toys, bumping into each other and down onto their bottoms. Another little boy was dressed like Ezekiel in striped overalls and hiking boots, and I looked around for the woman who had chosen the same outfit as I had. She met my eye, and we smiled tired hellos.

A few days after that, Claire and I shared a blustery picnic at a nearby playground. As the boys churned sand through their fists, we got to know each other. It seemed like months since I had talked, really talked, with another woman. We admitted to each other how weary we were in this strange life of parenting, how little we felt in control or convinced of what we were doing, how much frustration and repetition we endured amid this utter, fierce love. It was one of those urgent confidences, one of those seized moments you worry you'll miss. I needed a friend, and so did she.

Claire and I became inseparable. In the mornings, we'd call to plan where to meet, figure out whose house had better leftovers. On my birthday, she showed up with a cake, the day's only moment that wasn't about my baby. When she needed a nap, I'd take her boy. Living a few streets apart, we roamed our neighborhood, the strollers side by side. We revealed every private thought: on our marriages, our fears of not being good enough mothers, not always liking our new sons, our dismal sex lives, our absent parents.

Our lives were entirely about the now, and I shared that now with Claire. When my husband came home in the evenings, I was too tired to talk and passed the baby off and closed the bathroom door for a while. Claire knew, Claire understood. When one of us took her baby for shots, she called the other. When one of us started crying without reason in the fabric shop, the other was there in the store. Life became bearable and, bit by bit, better.

Susanna Sonnenberg is a columnist for the Montana Missoulian.

* name has been changed.

A different kind of sorority

Postpartum motherhood is its own world, an us-against-them sorority that demands allies specific to the time and the place. But those years never come to a well-marked end, have no gowned ceremonies, no championship seasons. Instead, interests change, marriages return to normal, the urgency melts away. When preschool came, Claire and I picked different programs, with opposing schedules. I had a second child while she chose not to (how newly remote she already seemed the day she visited me in the maternity ward), and, as our boys' personalities emerged, their differences tempered their playdates. We still saw each other, but weeks went by in between.

I assumed Claire and her son would appear for Ezekiel's 6th birthday party, although the boys were virtually strangers to each other by then. I kept an eye on the door throughout the celebration. Later, after the binge of cake and toys, after the scramble to clean up, I would realize Claire hadn't even called to say she wasn't coming.

I felt all the truth of her absence: We didn't need each other anymore. Being friends now was a choice, and she was no longer choosing me. Claire's life had expanded, with room for other friends. Skipping a birthday party, like missing a wedding, signaled a sea change in two mothers' relationship.

The friendship had evaporated. I mourned her, reviewing our weeks, months, years together -- the late-night confessions, the swim-lesson efforts with slippery babies, and our long afternoons alone with our sons. All of that belonged to another time that seemed not to exist anymore (in fact, Ezekiel remembers none of it). Once, I glimpsed Claire's profile at a concert, and heartache flooded me -- the lost trips to the river, the lost months of new motherhood, the lost friend.

The other day, paging through a photo album with my boys, now 8 and 4, I stopped at a picture in bright blues, bright oranges. A little Ezekiel sat beside Claire's son, each shielded by a pumpkin bigger than his body. I'd forgotten that afternoon, the boys about 2, the comfortable mess across my kitchen table as Claire and I scooped out the pumpkins. We roasted the seeds for the boys to taste, and Claire deftly carved unusual silhouettes into the gourds. She was standing right beside me, so close, as I took that picture.

I can't think of those debut years as a mother without feeling Claire standing next to me. We shared every fear, triumph, new word, and next stage, and when I revisit those slow days, it's not Ezekiel's father but Claire who occupies that dreamy stop-time, embedded forever in the first memories of my son's life.

CLOSE PRINT

That First Mom Friend By Susanna Sonnenberg, Parenting I wasn't planning to make a friend the day I met Claire.* From the mess of my kitchen, I'd read the newspaper notice of a playgroup at the library for new mothers and babies. I looked over at Ezekiel as he dropped slices of warm zucchini over the edge of his high chair. I grabbed him, got us dressed, and headed out of the house. In the basement of the local library, the mothers sat on carpet squares in tidy clusters as the toddlers circled the board books and toys, bumping into each other and down onto their bottoms. Another little boy was dressed like Ezekiel in striped overalls and hiking boots, and I looked around for the woman who had chosen the same outfit as I had. She met my eye, and we smiled tired hellos. A few days after that, Claire and I shared a blustery picnic at a nearby playground. As the boys churned sand through their fists, we got to know each other. It seemed like months since I had talked, really talked, with another woman. We admitted to each other how weary we were in this strange life of parenting, how little we felt in control or convinced of what we were doing, how much frustration and repetition we endured amid this utter, fierce love. It was one of those urgent confidences, one of those seized moments you worry you'll miss. I needed a friend, and so did she. Claire and I became inseparable. In the mornings, we'd call to plan where to meet, figure out whose house had better leftovers. On my birthday, she showed up with a cake, the day's only moment that wasn't about my baby. When she needed a nap, I'd take her boy. Living a few streets apart, we roamed our neighborhood, the strollers side by side. We revealed every private thought: on our marriages, our fears of not being good enough mothers, not always liking our new sons, our dismal sex lives, our absent parents. Our lives were entirely about the now, and I shared that now with Claire. When my husband came home in the evenings, I was too tired to talk and passed the baby off and closed the bathroom door for a while. Claire knew, Claire understood. When one of us took her baby for shots, she called the other. When one of us started crying without reason in the fabric shop, the other was there in the store. Life became bearable and, bit by bit, better. Susanna Sonnenberg is a columnist for the Montana Missoulian. * name has been changed. A different kind of sorority Postpartum motherhood is its own world, an us-against-them sorority that demands allies specific to the time and the place. But those years never come to a well-marked end, have no gowned ceremonies, no championship seasons. Instead, interests change, marriages return to normal, the urgency melts away. When preschool came, Claire and I picked different programs, with opposing schedules. I had a second child while she chose not to (how newly remote she already seemed the day she visited me in the maternity ward), and, as our boys' personalities emerged, their differences tempered their playdates. We still saw each other, but weeks went by in between. I assumed Claire and her son would appear for Ezekiel's 6th birthday party, although the boys were virtually strangers to each other by then. I kept an eye on the door throughout the celebration. Later, after the binge of cake and toys, after the scramble to clean up, I would realize Claire hadn't even called to say she wasn't coming. I felt all the truth of her absence: We didn't need each other anymore. Being friends now was a choice, and she was no longer choosing me. Claire's life had expanded, with room for other friends. Skipping a birthday party, like missing a wedding, signaled a sea change in two mothers' relationship. The friendship had evaporated. I mourned her, reviewing our weeks, months, years together -- the late-night confessions, the swim-lesson efforts with slippery babies, and our long afternoons alone with our sons. All of that belonged to another time that seemed not to exist anymore (in fact, Ezekiel remembers none of it). Once, I glimpsed Claire's profile at a concert, and heartache flooded me -- the lost trips to the river, the lost months of new motherhood, the lost friend. The other day, paging through a photo album with my boys, now 8 and 4, I stopped at a picture in bright blues, bright oranges. A little Ezekiel sat beside Claire's son, each shielded by a pumpkin bigger than his body. I'd forgotten that afternoon, the boys about 2, the comfortable mess across my kitchen table as Claire and I scooped out the pumpkins. We roasted the seeds for the boys to taste, and Claire deftly carved unusual silhouettes into the gourds. She was standing right beside me, so close, as I took that picture. I can't think of those debut years as a mother without feeling Claire standing next to me. We shared every fear, triumph, new word, and next stage, and when I revisit those slow days, it's not Ezekiel's father but Claire who occupies that dreamy stop-time, embedded forever in the first memories of my son's life.