Too much information. The phrase has become a talisman to ward off those unwanted bits of information — like the bathroom habits of a good friend, or the sex life of an unattractive coworker. I am still reeling from that horrible day two years ago when a colleague told me about a one-night stand with his friend’s sister. I regret not whipping out the TMI shield sooner that day.

Since then, I’ve been quite reserved with the information that I share, mainly out of the fear that something I say will encourage others to tell me things that I don’t want to hear. I try to stick to the basics. Yard work, restaurants, current events. Since Elyse was born, I’ve found myself talking about her a lot, and occasionally, childbirth and motherhood have tipped into the TMI category. But I’ve been trying to catch myself.
I was able to relax those restraints with one coworker a few months ago. Kevin joined the department while I was on maternity leave last year, and for the first time in who knows when, I was not the only African-American in my department. We developed an instant kinship.

Our first lunch was a discussion on corporate culture laced with humorous dish on our coworkers. Later talks on workplace challenges led to conversations on past jobs. Then past lives. His college days. My Delta days. His military family. My jovial one. His penchant for fitness. My madness for shoes. His goddaughter. My first daughter. Our shared love of Kenneth Cole.

Five months after that first lunch, Kevin left the company in search of greener pastures. His departure propelled me back into exchanges on lawn care and home improvement.
I saw Kevin a couple of weeks ago at an awards banquet. He greeted me with a warm hug. “Where’s Mike?” he asked. “He had to work,” I said. Kevin turned to the woman at his side. “This is my wife, Sharon.”

Wife? Not once in five months had I heard Kevin mention her name. I don’t even remember seeing her picture on his desk. I’m surprised that she couldn’t tell that I was caught off guard. I smiled at Sharon and said, “Nice to meet you.” She returned the smile and nodded with recognition when he told her that we used to work together.
One hundred and one scenarios went through my head as to why I’ve never heard of Mrs. Kevin. But instead of dwelling on those, I decided to just ask. “I’m a private person,” was his reply.

Private person? Bull. As much as we talked, her name should have come up once or twice. Or should it have? Was it that Kevin had been too closed, or had I been too open? Does the existence of a wife fall into the category of too much information?
As soon as Mike got home from work, I told him about seeing Kevin and Sharon at the dinner.

“You never mentioned that he was married,” Mike said. “That’s because he never said anything,” I told him.

Mike was stunned “What?” he said. “How can you not talk about your wife? I talk about you and Elyse all the time. I even show pictures.”

“I guess everyone is not as open about their personal lives as you are,” I said.

“Whatever,” Mike said. “I just don’t see how it didn’t come up.”

I couldn’t help but agree. Mike and Elyse are a big part of who I am, it’s difficult separate my family self from my work self. Although, I can see the appeal. After having one of those days when you want to cuss out everyone in the building, I would like to be able to leave my issues at the office. And I know for sure that Mike could use a little practice with that skill.

So perhaps the TMI force field extends a bit farther than I thought. I could benefit from a little separation where work/life balance is concerned. So I’ll stick to my landscaping and home improvement dialogues for a while to see how it goes. But I’m going to keep Elyse’s pictures on my desk. She’s just too cute to not show off.

When I was pregnant, I went to a designer baby store to look for crib bedding. “Sucker” was probably written across my forehead as I wandered doe-eyed through the aisles and fingered all of the store’s delights. I fell in love with a set called “Velour Animals.” Lions, giraffes, and the like prance around palm trees on a white background with green gingham trim. I wanted everything from the comforter to the window shades, and I especially wanted the mobile. What I didn’t know at the time was that this store, with its high-end prices, produced a low-end mobile. Don’t get me wrong; it looks great. Five plush animals — an elephant, a giraffe, a lion, a zebra, and a brown thing (I think it’s supposed to be a tiger) — dangle from white cord and spin lazily to “It’s a Small World.” The problem is in the mechanism. In a market filled with battery-operated gizmos that amuse kids with song after song, this mobile is the wind-up kind that plays for barely five minutes.

I didn’t get around to opening the mobile until after Elyse was a few weeks old. When I cranked it up for the first time, I was pissed. I had just seen one in a competitor’s catalog that had four or five settings. Just at I was about to snatch it down and put it back into the box, I noticed that my daughter was mesmerized by its lackadaisical action. My daughter slept through the first few weeks of her life, so I was surprised to see something hold her attention.

That mobile, in its simplistic glory, has become my friend during the past few months. It’s a safe-haven for Elyse that gives me a few moments when I don’t have to be within arms reach. And I can get more done in those five minutes than I ever thought possible. Here are just a few examples:

Tidy up the kitchen. I can unload and load the dishes into the dishwasher without sacrificing a single plate.

Laundry. I can put a load in the dryer, start a new load, and bring up a basket of clothes. If I’m lucky, I can even put them away.

Shower and dress. I have to run back into her room after the shower to restart the mobile so that I have time to get dressed. One day, I forgot that the blinds were open. I wonder if that’s why the neighbors don’t wave to me anymore.

The good news is that the mobile has helped me to learn how to break bigger tasks up into smaller ones so that I can finish them. The bad news is that I don’t always know when to slow down, and I rush when I don’t have to. Some nights after my daughter is asleep, I’m still whizzing through the house as if the mobile will shut off at any second. I speed through the supermarket, trying to buy $200 worth of groceries in less than 20 minutes. Or, I cram too much into a time span. Not even The Flash can get up, make breakfast, dress two people, take one of them to the sitter and get to work by 8:30 if he doesn’t wake up until 7:35.

When I was five years old, you couldn’t have told me that I wasn’t going to be the next Wonder Woman. I would spin in circles until I was dizzy, hoping that my stars-and-stripes Underoos would transform into plated armor. I accepted my fate as a mere mortal once I got older, but I think that motherhood subconsciously made me revisit that decision. I’ve been trying to take on the world, and there are a few chinks in my armor as a result. My nails are a bit misshaped. I carried a brown bag with a black outfit last week, and I haven’t been to the hair salon in three weeks. (For me, this in particular is a tragedy. I used to go to the hairdresser every Thursday.)

So I’m hanging up my golden lasso and seeking balance. It’s far more important for me to spend time with Elyse than to clean house or run errands, so I want to get that stuff out of the way. But if I’m wiped out from the race against the clock, then the time that I have with her isn’t well spent. I’m learning to sit my butt down and stop obsessing over the forks in the sink or the clothes in the hamper. I’ve decided to work in a couple of long baths or get a pedicure instead. And the next time I turn on the mobile, I’m going to stay in the room with Elyse and see if I can figure out what that brown thing is supposed to be. Maybe it’s a buffalo.

What do you do when you accidentally show your breasts to an intern? Do you confront the situation, or do you pretend that the whole thing never happened? That is what I had to deal with today, and it was a bad scene.

It was one of those days when you get up on time (early even), but you are still running late. Twice a day, I close my office door to pump breast milk for my daughter. I usually pump at around 9:30, but this morning I didn’t get to it until 10:15. I had a meeting at 10:30, so I quickly closed the sliding door. I was moving too fast for my own good, because I forgot to turn the lock. About 30 seconds into the process, I heard a soft knock immediately followed by the sound of the door’s metal wheels grinding on its track.

“NO, NO, NOOOOOOOOOO!” I started to yell. My back was to the door, and I turned slightly so that I could scream at my unwelcome guest. I was trying to cover my breasts and juggle the pump’s suction cups at the same time. The cups loosened from my boobs, and milk leaked all over my pants. The door was cracked about 6 inches, and I looked the intern in the eye. Damn, it wasn’t even a woman. He turned his head and quietly closed the door. I ran to lock it. I tried to pump some more, but I was so keyed up that I barely got a bottle’s worth.

I have no idea what he saw, and I really don’t want to know. As far as I’m concerned, I may as well have been naked on a pole. I made it my business to steer clear of his corner of the building, and he didn’t make any efforts to find me either. Needing a bit of comfort, I went to two women in my department. “I need a hug,” I wailed; then I told them the details. “Well, it could have been worse,” one said. “At least you didn’t have your shirt off.”

“I hear you embarrassed one of my guys,” the intern’s supervisor said to me later in the afternoon. Excuse me? I was the one who had her shirt hiked up. I know he was kidding, but the humiliation was still fresh. “I mean, he was red-faced embarrassed. He’s young, and he had no idea what was going on,” he continued.

Now, I realize that I forgot to lock my door, but wasn’t it being closed enough? Am I the only person who thinks that it is rude to do the “knock and open?” He probably thought that I was on the phone or something, but the purpose of knocking on a door is to get permission from the person on the other side.

My boyfriend, Mike, called to ask about my day, and I filled him in. He was ready to put on his shining armor. “Are you all right?” he asked. Do you want me to come to your office and talk to him?”

“No, honey,” I said. “I’m sure he wants to forget about the whole thing as much as I do.” Besides, Mike is a bodyguard. I have a feeling that his “talk” would be anything but that.

This is the latest in a string of incidents when my privates have been on display. Once you find out that you are pregnant, your body is no longer your own. At each doctor’s visit, you are examined from head to toe. While I was in labor, everyone from the doctor to my cousin thrice-removed walked in and out of the hospital suite as if it were the living room. And every now and then, I’ve even had to nurse my baby in public. So what’s one more person, I suppose. But to ensure that the number stays to a minimum, I made a “do not disturb” sign for my office door.

When I came home from work today, I put on a pair of hot-pink satin pajama pants and an old Delta T-shirt. Anyone who has heard of my sorority knows that I look a mess – Delta’s colors are crimson and cream. I tied an orange scarf on my head and slipped into a pair of worn Daniel Green house shoes; they’re a low mule with a thick band across the top. I made a funny face for my four-month-old, Elyse, and she laughed. When I saw myself in the full-length mirror, I had to laugh along with my daughter. I had turned into my mother.

Momma wears equally embarrassing ensembles around her house. Cheetah-print robes and stripped socks. Flowered housecoats over old plaid skirts. Faded green sweatshirts and purple pants, all while wearing her infamous Daniel Greens. When I was a kid, I swore that I would not wear such get-ups. But years later, here I was.

When this transformation occurred, I cannot say. It seems as though just yesterday I was a hip and happening single girl, ready to take on the world. But that must have been a long time ago, because I doubt that anyone uses the term “hip and happening” anymore. A friend of mine once said that she believes we resist our mothers’ influence until we are about 27, and then we just give in. Why is that? What do we learn at that point that allows us to accept our fate?

As a little girl, I did everything I could to be like my mother. I even remember that I tore up my toy sewing machine in an attempt to make a fur coat like hers. We wore complimentary, but not matching, outfits on Easters and Mothers Days.

Complimentary, but not matching. Of course that all changed with I hit those defiant teenage years. I juggled being stubborn, high-strung, and moody with trying to define myself through fashion. My clothing choices waffled between the homely and the weird. One day I would be searching the racks at a junior’s department, and the next day I would be riffling through Momma’s closet. The results were interesting, to say the least. Every now and then, people would say that I had my mother’s eyes. I tried not to notice.

I tried everything from track suits to business suits while in college, and I settled on a simple wardrobe once I hit my mid-20s. Tailored pants and shirts in solid colors (no prints), and I started to build a unique collection of shoes and purses. Meanwhile, my mother took jungle prints to a whole new level, matching cheetah-print accessories and separates with basic brown and black separates. In spite of my best efforts, people were starting to say that I looked more like Momma than ever. I claimed not to see it.

When I found out that I was going to have a baby last year, I started thinking a lot about motherhood in general, and I realized that some of Momma’s characteristics had long-ago slipped into my personality. We have the same inflections in our voices, the same way of cutting our eyes around, and we both fold our hands across our chests in satisfaction when we know that we have the upper hand in an argument. And my determination and outspokenness are growing by the day. People say that we have the same walk, a confident gait that makes people notice you when you enter the room. I can kind of see that one.

Did I accept who I am out of a sense of defeat? No way. I think that practicality starts to set in when you get a bit older. You can’t know someone your whole life and expect that person not to rub off on you. To think so is downright silly. And besides, a part of me is still like that little girl of yesteryear: I think that my mom is pretty cool.

There are still a few differences between us. My mother enjoys an occasional trip to the casino. I prefer an occasional trip to the spa. I love to try new wines. My mother loves to find new ways to mix a stiff strawberry daiquiri. And we still don’t agree on the uses of cheetah-print in a wardrobe.

As soon as I finish posting this blog, I’m going online to look for some Daniel Greens. My pair is almost worn out. I think I’ll get a pair for my mother, too. Complimentary, but not matching, of course.

My introduction was going to be legendary, full of humor and wit. But at I started to write, I decided that trying to explain who I am and why I am writing sucked the fun out of it all, the same way that new Dyson vacuum cleaner claims to suck dirt out of a carpet. And if it’s not going to be fun, then what’s the point?

So, here we go. Let me know what you think. And if you see a sale on those Dyson vacuum cleaners, let me know about that, too. I really want one, but those monsters are expensive!