The One Where Mark was Right

There’s a funny thing about "firsts" in life. Some firsts are pure magic—your first concert, your first kiss, your first real paycheck. As a parent, your child’s first smile, the first steps, the exact second Christmas morning changes from confusing to mind-blowing.

Then there are the other firsts. The ones nobody puts in a scrapbook: The first time you change a diaper and it takes a solid seven minutes. Your first jungle gym assembly in 90-degree heat as your marriage hangs in the balance. Your first time trying to sneak $5 under a sleeping child’s pillow and you realize the Tooth Fairy’s profit margins are taking a serious hit from inflation.

Life is a chaotic cocktail of thrilling, terrifying, and violently gross moments. Which brings me to my latest "first."

We have an opossum living under our dock. It drives our dog, Truman, absolutely, certifiably insane. When this furry phantom visits, Truman treats the patio like a high-security prison yard. He paces back and forth, vibrating with existential dread, until we finally let him out to patrol. The other night, Mark and I were trying to watch TV while Truman’s relentless whining reached a fever pitch. Normally I’d let him investigate, but he kept tracking mud back inside—and this dog sleeps in our bed.

I had to draw a line. "No more, go lay down!"

We all trudged upstairs to bed. But did Truman sleep? Absolutely not. For the first full hour, he paced and whimpered, deeply offended that an opossum dared to breathe air on our property. Finally, I cranked up the sound machine, willed myself to sleep, and ignored a weird, faint aroma. I figured Mark or Truman had simply passed gas.

Spoiler alert: It was not gas.

At 3:00 AM, a tiny voice piped up at our bedroom door. "Mom, I missed-ed you."

It was Theo. I got up to walk him back, sleepily dodging a constellation of dark, mysterious splotches strewn across our brand-new, natural-fiber rug.

Now, let's pause for a moment of historical accuracy: Mark had begged me not to buy this rug. He warned me the natural fibers were scratchy. He warned me they would be a nightmare to clean. But did I listen? Of course not. I loved the aesthetic.

I tucked Theo in, and as my eyes adjusted to the dark on the way back, I noticed the spots again. Thinking Truman had chewed up one of Mark's socks, I casually poked one with my toe.

It rolled.

"Sorry, I have to turn on the light," I whispered to a sleeping Mark. Click.

"Oh my GOD!"

"What?!" Mark shouted, bolting upright like he was dodging sniper fire.

"Truman pooped all over the rug!" I wailed.

"Ugh, just deal with it in the morning, turn the light off!"

"But it's in the rug, oh my God!" I cried, staring at the ruined natural grass fibers now bound together with canine treachery.

"TURN THE LIGHT OFF!" he yelled back.

"Don't yell at me, I didn't shit on the rug!" I fired back, snapping the light off and huffing back into bed.

I lay there wide awake, plotting strategy. Because it was made of natural fibers, scrubbing it would only grind the disaster in deeper. Should I dab? Let it dry? Before I could spiral too far into despair, Theo started screaming from a nightmare. I had to choose: try to get him back to sleep in his own room, or salvage what little sleep I had left by crawling into his fire truck twin bed.

I chose the fire truck. Three hours of sleep later, Ethan woke up.

After dropping Ethan off at religion class Saturday morning, I locked myself in the bedroom armed for battle: a bowl of warm water, a dustpan, a nail brush, paper towels, OxiClean, Dawn dish soap, and a plastic scraper.

Crime scene analysis revealed the accident happened around midnight—and that a stray pillow had fallen onto the mess and been stepped on by a sleepwalking four-year-old. Lovely.

Time was ticking. I needed to get the dried chunks up before my husband could gloat. I got on my hands and knees with the plastic scraper, discovering in real-time just how aggressively scratchy natural fibers are on bare skin.

For the denser spots where the scraper just smeared things around, I had to pivot to full MacGyver mode: a safety pin to pry under the grass fibers, and a pair of tweezers to pull the mess out inch by painstaking inch. By lunchtime, I had cleared the solids, fed the kids, and returned for Phase Two: washing. I blotted with warm water and Dawn, deploying the OxiClean and nail brush only to the most stubborn casualties.

At 1:30 PM, I had to pause to take Theo to a birthday party. All I could think about the entire time was the rug.

When we got home at 4:30, I bolted upstairs. Mark was already standing there staring at it.

"What do you think?" I asked tentatively.

The dry spots looked okay, but where I'd had to scrub and soak, the results were... well, lackluster. "It still has to dry..." I offered weakly.

"It looks... like someone shit on the rug," Mark replied, a small smile creeping in. "Do you need a hug?"

"Yes, please," I sighed, folding into his arms. "I'll try the Hoover on it tomorrow."

"Couldn't hurt."

As we walked down the stairs, he started to chuckle.

"Don't say it!" I warned.

"What?! I'm not saying another rug choice would have been easier to clean... but I'm not not thinking it," he laughed.

And that’s the thing about firsts—and life in general. You live, you make mistakes, and you learn. In this case, I learned to factor our furry friends and our feet into home decor choices, as well as taking note of my own stubbornness. I'm slowly realizing my way isn't the only way, and that trying to control every little detail is exhausting.

All of this has me thinking about how Mark and I parent and partner. I used to benchmark myself against other women constantly—What are they wearing? How many date nights do they have? How do their kids look so polished? But I finally accepted that their lives are none of my business and comparison is a trap.

These days, I only take notes from a trusted few who have what actually matters to me: a home where everyone genuinely likes each other. I've traded toxic comparison for basic self-reflection: Am I being kind? Is my ego driving this? Am I doing the next right thing? Being stubborn and controlling is a full-time job with zero benefits, so I’m learning to go with the flow, hear my husband out, and let my kids lead a little. It’s definitely trial and error, but it’s about progress, not perfection.

As the guinea pig child, Cole seems to be surviving my steep learning curve, God bless him, though his brothers are reaping the rewards. At the end of the day, we're showing our kids how to live: do your best, make mistakes, apologize, and make better choices next time—especially when picking out rugs.