Joe doesn’t want to go to school, he wants to stay home and play. I tell him if he puts his socks on, we can go to target later and he can get a Car. He wants mama to play chutes and ladders with him forever. Morrison explains that mama must go to work, so he can eat, and have Cars. He cries. He doesn’t want his breakfast. I say I’ll pay him a dollar to try cinnamon toast. He wants a rocket for Christmas, he thinks Christmas is Getting, I remind him to ask Santa for something for his sister, too. I sit and watch him play, quietly spiraling over whether I’m doing it right, my resting state. He’s alone in his world. I watch him see a younger kid without a car. He hands him one. THIS IS FOR YOU, He says, and then sees me watching, and he beams so hard, knowing that when he’s kind, it makes Mom happy, so I must have done something right. What matters less than my being a good mom is him being a good kid, and for the 100th time I remember the liberating, devastating fact that even though you make your child with your body, the rest of it has little to do with you.