it's not just a job

When you choose to give up smoking because life is pulsating

When in a blink, you drop down get dirty scooping some poopie

When you allow yourself to be unglamorous - hair uncombed

When your time is not yours, sleep is a forgotten course

When you had to answer little questions in the middle of tv, a favorite book

When you’re yanked out of bed for the little one is wailing,

Or when the alarm failed to alarm and school bus is beeping

When it’s 4am and your hand is feeding and one foot is crib swinging

And you try hard to catch some sleep for in a few hours work would be knocking

When all you watch is cartoons over and over again. And again.


That you're suddenly a wiz in children's television

You’ve unlearnt how to cringe on spiders

You’re a big pillow during thunders 

When you can’t wait to get out of the office and scurry your way home

When you choose to forego dessert and bring the sweet treat to your rabbits

When your walls are big canvasses, splattered with all colors

When you have chipped furniture, chairs with missing leg, broken vases,

Sagging bed from jumping sprees and innumerable dives

When you leave the lamp on to light the dark bedroom

And you are their superhero shooing larking creatures

When everyday you clean goo, their teeth were a cave with cobwebs to be brushed

When you’re one big paranoid over safety

And you disinfect like crazy

When they bump on everything

And shniffles rule and you have to nurse each knick and every imaginable bruise

When you monitor temperature, flinch with the sound of cough,

Because you know when something's wrong and can tell right out

When they frolic in the water and swim until they’re blue

When your heart leaps out your chest as they sprint, somersault


cross the street, or say some darn thing

When they ask permission to a pajama party

Or on the cellphone texting somebody


When you get front row seats on

Little hands, tiny toes, missing tooth, sun-kissed soft hair, sparkling smiles,

Artworks, lost pencils, crayons, spilt milk, juice and crushed cookies.

When they draw you in squiggly lines with big eyes and love written all over it.

When you develop a third eye on your back with an acute sense of hearing for

sibbling squables;

When baby packing means bringing the whole house and yet you still forget a thing;

When lego parts are scattered asunder on the floor,

your lotions and colognes tumble from being a building,


And Barbie’s shoes had to be found, yes, right now.

Puzzle pieces on your dresser, toy cars in your bag, left-over oreo for your snacks

All the happy meals you can eat so the collection is complete.

When spiderman webs his way out on the roof, waiting breathtakingly for it

to web its way back. And it doesn’t. So you buy another.

When your vocabulary is constrained to “No!”, and all they say in turn is what else but,  “No!”

Or favorite word is "waaiit"

When you run out of warnings, find yourself hoarse from counting




When it’s a battle of wills during bathe time, eating time, tv time and nap time.

When you sit through your countless PTAs, study the school handbook and spot loopholes,

write excuse letters, sign on reminders, sharpen pencils, prepare mock tests,

"what's for baon?" a fixture in your subconcious;

When you’re a cook, a nurse, doctor, police chief;

First teacher, ball catcher, magician, party planner;

A toy fixer, toy sorter, crappy toy instructions analyst;

A personal shopper, bag packer, a gluer, cutter, name tag labeler,

and a project maker;

A dance/sports/speech/financial/life coach, photographer and videographer;

A meat flaker, fish thorn finder, fruit slicer, candy peeler;

A storyteller, a fetcher, washer, janitor, a hair-stylist, a stitcher;

A shoe lacer, sweat wiper, speller, editor, gut reader;

A lie detector, and trouble-sniffer, spectator at mayhem;

A heart healer,  a killjoy person, an ATM;

When you’re ask.com., the explainer, a tagalog-english translator, problem-solver;  

A listener, an unpaid psychiatrist, best cheerleader, and the biggest superhero of all,

When you're all these rolled into one.

Then you have the world’s most amazing job.

You are a mom.