I zip up the third carry bag and sigh with satisfaction. We are on track to get to a 10 o’clock toddler dance class and I am as excited as a prisoner contemplating a jailbreak.

At the age of two, B has finally settled into one long, reliable nap each afternoon. A nap by the clock. A gift for me, as it turns out.

With his reliable naptime, I no longer needed to abandon T, my four-year-old, at several random times in a day so I can put baby B to sleep.

Plus, our days have structure. The clock has power. I can plan to leave the house with two young children and a lot of carry bags at a specific time. This is a big deal.

And we are all set today. The children are dressed, with no remains of their breakfast or morning tea on their face or clothes. The bags are packed. Miraculously, I am out of pyjamas too.

I allow myself a little moment of happy anticipation. We are going to a dance class – wow!

I was a dancer once, long before having children. I did concerts, exams, award nights, all of it. I gave it up in university – then wished I hadn’t – but I still had the tendency to move to the sound of music.

Even now, I never resist the urge to let my body move instinctively to music and to enjoy it. Today, I am so excited to watch my children experience that joy too.

Time to go

“T, can you find B and tell him it’s time to go?” I ask her. I glance at the clock, remembering what must come later in the day: toddler lunchtime followed by toddler naptime. A routine to be respected and obeyed. Ignore at your peril.

I check the fridge again. The little lunchplates are ready for the minute we walk back in the door. Which kicks off 30 minutes of go-time—enough for B to eat at toddler pace, a quick nappy change, and put that beautiful head on the pillow.

Then I can breathe out for a little while.

“Mama,” says T as she comes back down the corridor, “he said he wants a book first”.

“A book? Now?” I ask.

She nods.

I swallow a mild panic at this potential delay.

I walk to B’s room and find him sitting on the floor cushions. I notice with relief he has not yet removed his tiny shoes.

He is holding open Come Down, Cat, by Sonya Hartnett and Lucia Masciullo, a lovely story about the risks a boy will take for the cat he loves. B is staring intently at his favourite page, where the main character Nicholas has rescued the cat and is cradling the happy feline in his arms.

We have read Come Down, Cat at least twice a day for the last three weeks. Including once before breakfast today.

“Darling boy, I think we need to hop in the car now,” I venture lightly, willing him to look up at me. “How about we put the cat book in our bag and go?”

He doesn’t look up.

He closes the book and points to the cover. “Can you read the cat book to me?” he squeaks. And only then looks up with a hopeful glance.

Before I can respond, T comes over with yet another book in her sweet little hands.

“Mama has read that one already today,” she says with the all the authority of the older sibling. “Let’s take this one instead.”

She is holding Go Home, Cat, also by Sonya Hartnett and Lucia Masciullo, which we found at the library yesterday. We don’t yet know yet if it is the prequel or sequel to Come Down, Cat and frankly it didn’t really matter. B and T were excited enough to find Nicholas and his cat on the front cover again.

I smile at T, understanding she is trying to be helpful, but I am not quick enough to respond.

“No!” B shouts. He hugs the book tightly to his chest. “I wanna take this one!” His brow furrows, his chin hardens and his little lips thin into a tight, angry line.

Sibling showdown

T recognises the invitation immediately and, naturally, joins in. She walks over to me and holds the book out expectantly. Her big brown eyes bore into me, willing me to take her side.

“Take this one Mama,” she says, sending her brother a doleful side glance, “not that one. We haven’t read the new one yet.”

“Nooo!” B screams insistently.

This all happens in a matter of seconds, but I am on it.

I am now familiar enough with these eruptions to know the best place for me is on the ringside, not in the middle. The referee should never hit the floor.

“What a good idea,” I say encouragingly to T. “We’ve been waiting to read that one since yesterday, haven’t we?” She nods at me and I rush on. “Why don’t we keep it next to your milk cup?”

I wink slowly and visibly at her. She breaks into a smile of recognition and winks back, which involves her entire gorgeous face.

She knows this is code for ‘Let’s secretly do that when your little brother is sleeping’. It is a code that started a few months after B was born, inviting her into a conspiracy so enticing it allowed her to wait alone for long stretches until he was asleep.

She would have the company of her milk cup, while I settled the baby in his cot, and a sense of anticipation for the book, the play dough or other promised activity.

She scurries away to place Go Home, Cat in its significant place in the kitchen.

I turn to B, who is still clutching the book at his chest and still sporting a furrowed brow. As a second child, he’d already learned the skill of sustained defence.

But his brow relaxes instantly when I say, ‘Let’s bring your book in the car.’ He toddles over and takes my hand. We meet T in the corridor and move towards the garage.

Dance class, here we come.

Twenty minutes later, I park the car outside a community hall surrounded by swaying eucalypts. The mid-morning sun is warming the cool air.

As is now custom, I refrain from turning off the ignition until the song playing on the car stereo is finished. The end of The Grand Old Duke of York is met with applause from B and T in the back seat.

They lean in close to me as we enter through the wooden front doors. A woman dressed in black leggings and a black shirt is doing stretches at the front of the hall. Behind her is a box of colourful toys.

“I think that’s Penny,” I say encouragingly to the children. According to the website, Penny had started this small dance school herself because she believed in ‘children’s innate need for self-expression through dance and movement’.

“Come in, come in,” Penny says, smiling. Her hair is tied back loosely and she moves with all the softness of a lifelong dancer.

“Hello Penny! This is B, he is two years old,” I gesture to my son, “and this is T, who is four years old.” Neither of the children look up from the floor so I add, “And we all absolutely love music”.

“Oh, that’s wonderful,” Penny replies, “Tell me, B, what’s your favourite song?” B takes Penny’s outstretched hand and replies, “Build me up Buttercup”.

“No, B,” T chimes in, taking Penny’s other hand, “that’s my favourite song.” She looks up at Penny and patiently explains, “His favourite song is actually the Play School song”.

Penny leads them toward the box of colourful things. I breathe out. I take our bags over to the side of the room, sit down and take my shoes off.

Bend and stretch

A few more families wander in, all mums with their kids. I watch as Penny asks B and T to bend and stretch and touch their toes.

I smile up at a woman as she puts her bags down next to ours, with a small boy behind her dressed head-to-toe in orange. I notice she is sniffing a little, and he has those distinctive after-cry hiccups.

“Tough morning?” I ask gently. She sniffs again and nods. I briefly marvel at that instant understanding that can pass between mothers with young children.

“I didn’t think we’d make it here,” she says quietly. “He loves dancing, but he was just refusing to leave the house. We were both in tears. I almost gave up, then he said he’d come if he can wear orange.” She laughs a little. “I never understood the will of a toddler until I had one, and then it was too late.”

Her son is now sitting next to B, reaching out to touch the tips of his orange socks. The mother releases an audible breath.

Penny is playing some lovely instrumental music for the warm-up. She has all ten children eagerly limbering up.

I feel my own body relaxing. Perhaps it is the music, or perhaps it is the cautious expansion of my personal space bubble, now that my children are more than two meters away.

It’s a similar feeling of release after the children go to sleep at night. The letting-go of responsibilities. The love of my children remains, but the constant mental agility and physical movement have ended for the day. At those moments, they are safe in bed, and I am so at peace.

All of a sudden, the boy in orange comes charging over and bowls into his mother. He buries his face in her shoulder, but we all hear him say, “I hate this! Take me home!”

I look over to Penny, who is showing the children how to do the tree pose. She sends an understanding smile in our direction but keeps her focus on the other children.

Unfortunately though, the children’s eyes are starting to wander. Many of them are turning to look at the boy and his mother curiously.

The mother whispers, “Please darling, please can we try to join in the tree yoga? Can you do that for me?”

I know her tone. I hear it in the effort to sound encouraging without pleading. Because in a certain mood, as soon as a toddler grasps what a parent desperately wants, they are likely to lunge themselves in the other direction of that thing. It’s developmental, we know, and it’s normal. But it’s exhausting.

The boy untangles himself from his mother and throws himself on the floor with a thud. The children come out of their tree poses and stare as the boy curls himself into a ball and starts rolling around on the floor. He is shouting, ‘I want to go home!’ over and over again.

His mother buries her face in her hands and starts to sob. She is spent.

I think quickly. I stand up.

“Excuse me, Penny,” I call out. She glances over at me, not paying any attention to the ball of orange cotton on the floor. “Can parents join in too?”

She nods, not breaking her warrior pose and gestures at me with her outstretched hand to come over.

How it feels to fly

I touch the other mother gently on the shoulder and offer my hand. She takes it and we walk over to join the group.

When I look back over my shoulder, the boy has stopped rolling around and is watching his mother warily.

Penny works through a few more yoga poses then we stand in a circle. She instructs the children to move their feet in a rhythm. “Step toe, step toe, step toe, step…aaaand jump!”

I feel my body instantly responding, my hips and shoulders and arms wanting to join in and move with the music. I don’t resist it at all.

“That’s wonderful!” Penny exclaims to everyone. “Now, see if you can do the same things sideways.” She does the step facing left, then swivels to face the right and does the step again.

I follow suit, enjoying the swivel and the flourish. It’s just a simple movement, and I am surrounded by small children tripping over themselves, but I am relishing it.

I feel something opening up inside me. I feel like I am expanding, taking up a space I haven’t occupied in years. My body moves in whatever way it wants to, not meeting anyone else’s needs or picking anything up off the floor.

I feel free.

“Okay, time to get our twirling ribbons out,” Penny calls. The children run over to the box while Penny selects the next song on her playlist.

My smile widens as the sound of piano fills the room. It’s one of my favourite songs: I wish I knew how it would feel to be free by Nina Simone.

I am vaguely aware of children moving around the room with their twirling toys. Even the boy in orange has joined in, still clinging to his mother while she twirls an orange ribbon around him.

But I keep moving in my own way to the rhythm of the song, moving a little away from the group, letting everything but Nina’s voice and the piano fade away.

It’s intoxicating, this feeling of moving freely, of being in charge of no one but myself.

Coming back

“Mama!”

B comes towards me waving around his twirling ribbon. “Look! It’s blue!” he says.

I give him a nod of acknowledgement but I keep moving in the direction the music takes me, which is a few inches further away from him.

He stops twirling the stick. “Mama!” he calls, louder now. “Look at my blue ribbon!”

He stares and waits for my response.

I register the signs of his rising temper but as if from a distance, as I am still immersed in my own movement, in my private communication with Nina’s anthem.

I give him a little wave and a thumbs up. But it’s not enough.

“MAMA!” he yells, loud enough so T and all the other children stop to look at him. But his eyes are only on me. “Look at ME!” he demands.

And that’s it. The spell is broken.

Does Penny turn the music off or do I just stop hearing it? The rush inside my ears is all I can hear, the sound of all my mama responsibilities crashing back at once.

It’s a similar experience in the middle of the night, when a child wakes up in terror or crawls in with a high temperature. The shock of the duty to care returning in a flash. Followed by tenderness and concern.

In this moment, though, the shock is followed by a sharp stab of grief.

I don’t want to be available to him right now. But I must.

I take a long, deep breath and I kneel down in front of B. “You got your favourite colour, darling, that’s wonderful,” I say brightly.

His shoulders relax, his pout disappears. “I want to dance with you,” he murmurs.

“Of course, let’s dance together,” I reply and get up, pulling him along.

T comes over to join us. She slides one arm affectionately around my leg and keeps it there, continuing to twirl her ribbon with the other hand. B curls his arm around my other leg.

“That looks like lovely fun,” Penny comments on our little moving unit of three. T and B are grinning, one each of my lower limbs in their command, their blue and green ribbons twirling about.

I don’t respond to Penny.

The mother with the boy in orange gives me a sympathetic, knowing smile. It’s enough to help me keep going.

Story time

The mid-morning goes to schedule. We are home on time and lunch is gulped down quickly. The children are buzzing happily from their morning dance experience.

I am not feeling so high.

When the children talk, I nod and murmur absently. I’ve emptied the car, helped with toileting, taken tiny shoes off tiny feet, served and cleaned up lunch. But I am feeling so robotic.

I feel disconnected from the present moment, as if watching myself go through the motions from a distance.

Which is a new feeling. Until today, I’ve found it nearly impossible to be with my kids without being utterly present. For the first time today, a part of me is holding a grievance. I don’t hold it against my kids; I am just trying to keep them away from it while I nurse it, I guess.

Thankfully, B does not resist his naptime today. He settles to sleep quickly in his toddler bed. I close the door and tiptoe down to the kitchen, where T is waiting with her milk cup in hand. I fill the cup and gesture to the couch.

T puts the book Go Home, Cat on my lap, leans into me and takes a long sip of her milk. With that, I remember the promise I made in the morning.

I feel myself melting as our bodies connect. Even in robot-mode, I can’t resist the power of my child snuggling into me.

“I like the last page of the other Nicholas and cat book the most,” she says, “when they are just sitting together looking at the rain.”

“Me too,” I say. “Let’s see what happens to the cat this time.”

We discover this story is quite different from the other one. Nicholas is not that interested in being close to his cat. He’s got a coin in his hand and he is dreaming of the liquorice at the lolly shop.

The cat tries to follow him, but he urges it to leave him alone. “Don’t follow me, cat” he pleads.

In a flash, my sense of grievance shoots up and disappears.

Like me, Nicholas just wants to feel untethered. He wants to follow his own whim. It doesn’t mean he loves his cat any less.

Suddenly, I feel clear-headed, and I am much more interested in where this story goes.

Together again

The story goes where nearly all children’s stories must go: to safety. To resolution; to security; to certainty restored.

Nicholas is forced to choose between his desire for liquorice and the safety of his beloved cat.

He chooses the cat.

I linger on the final illustration of their warm embrace, then I gently close the cover.

“So it kind of has the same ending as the first book, doesn’t it?” I say to T.

“Mmm-hmm,” she says sleepily. I turn to her and find her eyelids are closing. The morning’s dance class has exhausted her too.

I watch with tenderness as her lovely eyelashes meet and a tiny, relaxed breath escapes from her little lips.

I stay very, very still, enjoying the sensation of her tiny body going loose against mine. I don’t mind holding her weight, surrendering my body to it, even though just a few minutes earlier I thought had nothing left to give today. Just being next to her is enough.

I lean back into the couch ever so slightly. I gaze at Nicholas and his cat on the front cover. Their bond is so obvious. Their eyes are locked on each other and their feet seem to follow the same path.

I think about Nina Simone’s voice summoning that universal longing for freedom.

I feel my own eyelids drooping. As I drift toward sleep, I savour the feeling of letting go.

The thought wanders across my mind that perhaps this will be the strongest feeling of freedom I can get for the next few years, at home with my children safe and sleeping nearby.

As sleep closes in, I make a silent wish that more freedom will come in the future without me longing for it at all.