That Must Be So Easy

Yesterday I chopped all my hair off.  Seriously, it is so short...yikes!  You know how you shouldn't go grocery shopping when you're hungry?  Maybe you shouldn't get your hair cut when it's hot & your long hair's driving you nuts!  Anyway, while the girl was cutting my hair we were talking.  When we got to the part about kids (she has 3 kids, all under 4), she found out Kiley is my only one (I don't often go into my whole pregnancy loss background with strangers).  Her response was, "That must be so easy!"  I didn't really know how to respond to that.  From the moment I found out I was pregnant, until now almost 6 years later, I don't know that "easy" would be how I would describe motherhood...more like:  wonderful, hard, amazing, terrifying, precious, an honor, praying I don't screw up too bad, and completely exhausting.
I know the reason she said it is because I have an only child.  Honestly, I would've thought the same thing.  It's simple math, right?  2 is harder than 1; 3 is harder than 2, etc.  Where do we come up with this?  Every family has their struggles.  Yes, there are things about having an only child that are easier.  It's easier that we only have 1 set of activities to manage/pay for, etc.  It's easier only having to transport 1 child in our small car instead of 2 or 5 or 10.  But, there are things about having an only child that are hard.  Like the fact that she's an only child because of miscarriage.  Or that she doesn't have any built in sibling playmates...WE are her playmates on most days (yes she does have friends besides us :)  Or the fact that she is an extrovert with two introverted parents.  Or that you wonder if your child will be totally screwed up if they don't have siblings (shout out to all my super-cool only child cousins who help knock down that fear :)
I wonder why we do that.  Why we look at someone else and say "Man, they have it made.  They have the perfect life.  If only I had (fill in the blank:  that house, a certain family type, a marriage, a baby, that job, more money)" or "If only I didn't live here, if only I lived closer, or farther away"  Or maybe I'm the only one who has thoughts like that.  Maybe instead of worrying about how green the grass is on the other side, we need to focus on tending our own lawn :)