Remember last week when I talked about letting The Kid lead me around for a while? I felt so poetic and evolved making that observation…then, on Sunday, we went to the park. And it was a total debacle.

This halo experience, as I’ve related, has been beyond better than we expected. TK has not let seven pounds of carbon and titanium slow him down for a second, and most days he can be spotted running up and down our driveway or trying to climb the stairs two at a time. If anything, the “this hurts me more than it hurts you” principle seems to be applying here–and I have the scars to prove it: red indentations scattered across my forearms from holding him at the sink for hand washing; bruises on my chest from the forehead bolts he doesn’t seem to notice as he dives in for a cuddle; sore muscles from heaving him onto his changing table. I’m not complaining (more than my usual amount)–these are battle wounds I’m only too happy to endure if they lead to an upright noggin. And, to be fair, he’s the one with the three-inch-long incision in the back of his neck, along with a smaller one on the left side for good measure. To be clear: I’ve never disputed the fact that he’s a better person than I am.

The physical aspect of this experience always jockeyed for first-place position on the concern wall of my mind with the psychological aspect, anyway. There is the emotional wear-and-tear that comes with watching your child suffer, and wondering if any of it will lead to a James Frey-esque stint in rehab for him down the road. There’s the mind-numbing, poor-judgment-ridden, sickly nature of exhaustion. TK’s progress has trumped both of those possibilities and left them languishing in my memory. And, until recently, a third possibility was eating his dust too. But that possibility had more to do with how I handle the halo than with how he does. And I’m not quite as resilient as my two-year-old.

For most of my life, I’ve searched for a comfortable spot under the radar. I realized, after years in New York and under the spotlight of grace, that I was just afraid of being seen. And with TK’s hardware update, I was concerned about taking him out in public: the stares, the questions, the scrutiny. I was afraid of my short fuse and snarky retorts and how it all might combine into a combustible situation that left me getting Tasered on the floor of Target. But lest the ire-fueled side of my personality get too much attention, allow me to admit that I was also concerned about over-explaining our situation to strangers; about caring way too much what they were thinking; of not withering under their stares.

I was afraid of being seen, which is another way of saying I was afraid of being vulnerable.

You can guess how many effs TK gives about the stares and questions: exactly zero. I swear he doesn’t even know the halo is there. And for a while, I was immune to others’ reactions too. If not caring what people thought was cool, you could have considered me Miles Davis. Then we went to Target and this one woman gaped at us openly. Same thing at the grocery store, this time while The Husband was with us. “I’m going to put a sign on the halo that says, ‘Take a picture–it lasts longer’,” I seethed to him in Publix, my interior Department of Self-Righteous Anger on high alert. With all the major crises so far averted, I was freed up for indignation. (It didn’t help that when I was returning TK to his carseat in the parking lot, I lost my grip on his seat belt and punched myself in the nose. Hard.)

Then yesterday, TK and I met The Sis and The Niece at the park. Things started off well: TK gripped my hand obediently as we shuffled along the entry trail. The Niece had even demanded to wear a helmet–maybe she wanted a “special hat” too. So there we were: the sisters and their spectacularly-crowned offspring. Then half our party headed off to the play structure and TK and I were left to navigate some dirt paths full of dogs and runners, and I committed the Cardinal Sin against a Toddler: I told him no. You know, to KEEP HIM FROM GETTING TRAMPLED. And he had a screaming meltdown right there in the park.

It went downhill from there. TK never recovered from his offended need to choose his own path (hmm…what’s that like?), and The Sis and Niece had their own problems: as they approached us so we could leave together, I heard the words, “Well then you can have water for dinner!” In the parking lot, a disembodied voice echoed from inside a minivan, “BUT I DON’T WANT TO GO HOOOOOME!” TK did his part by plopping onto the ground and wailing.

Oh, the magical time of childhood.

Our goodbyes were terse as I hustled TK into the car and wheeled out of that dystopian nightmare called Sunday Afternoon at the Park. I explained to my nonverbal son why he didn’t have the right to behave the way he had. We got home and I handed him off to The Husband in exchange for a glass of wine. And for the next few hours, I revisited the scene in my head and asked myself what really bothered me about it. Because toddlers? They act like assholes all the time. Everyone at the park knows it. But not every toddler is in a halo, and not every mother-son duo is examined the way we had been. No flying under the radar here.

And I realized that much of parenthood–much of loving anyone, much of living, period–means being willing to remain in the tension of unrealized potential. Others’, and our own. Much of marriage means that. Much of friendship. And much of grace means knowing who does that on our behalf.

Remaining in the tension of waiting for words, of anticipating halo removal (it’s FEBRUARY 21ST, Y’ALL!), of hoping for an upright noggin, of wondering whether he’ll get a sibling, of taking each other for granted, of learning to communicate the truth in love, of caring less about what strangers think. Of trusting that grace always ensures that our best interest is the one this is all headed toward, even when we feel like we’re in the dark and the road is long and we keep getting punched in the face.