She brings along two books for the car ride (always an extra because you just never know). They're both books she's already read once, twice, three times. I ask her but what about the book she was reading last night -- the new one from the library. I don't feel like reading that one. I ask her why not. Something really sad happens. What? So sad that I don't want to tell you about it. Oh, I reply. I see. I start explaining rising action and climax and resolution -- wah wah wah, I even hear it that way myself. Here she goes again. But I want her to understand that even if something sad happens, the story will end in some kind of resolution. Not always happy, but some way to see the world. It keeps right on turning. When we get there I see she's been reading the library book anyway. I ask her if she got any farther. If she found out how Lucy deals with her brother's death. No she says. I ask her why not. She holds up her book, marked very near the beginning. She started over. I wonder aloud if she'll keep going this time when she gets to the sad part or just put it away. She doesn't answer. I wah wah wah again, do you think Lucy just hid under her bed for the rest of her life, do you think Lucy finds a way to feel happy even though this sad thing happened to her? She doesn't know. Think about Lucy, the girl. Did she seem brave? Or like a bowl full of mush?
At home, much later, she approaches me on silent bare feet. She stands next to my chair. She hands me the book. You should read it, she says. You finished it? Yes. Are you glad? Yes.
Sunday, October 7, 2012
Saturday, October 6, 2012
at the market
They stand talking, two stones sunk in the center of a stream. Then, an embrace. One of the women begins to cry. Her mouth forms the shape of something unknowable. Familiar. She doesn't cover her face. People float by on an unseen current, the tops of their heads sparkling in the sun. Pain ripples through space. My fingernails hurt.
Friday, October 5, 2012
sun burst
Topping this stack of sunny days sits a sky that's laundry rinse water grey. It's the unbalanced block that topples the tower, a glass shattering on the kitchen floor.
But when I peel the old sheets off the bed and spread the fresh one with a snap of my wrist, there it is: the scent of dried sun, exploding all over the room. It was here all day, preserved in the laundry basket, shoved in the corner of the room.
But when I peel the old sheets off the bed and spread the fresh one with a snap of my wrist, there it is: the scent of dried sun, exploding all over the room. It was here all day, preserved in the laundry basket, shoved in the corner of the room.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
refreshment
A bouquet of flowers sits on the table. It's been here for more than a week and the stems still stand straight; the colors still breathe. The blooms could be fake. But their drinking water dips lower each day.
And there it is -- the proof that they're alive.
But underneath that bright crown, brown begins to edge the green. Leaves curl and shrink into themselves. One petaled head trades satin for dry paper and bows out, exhaling something muskier than her sisters. The water is almost gone. They gulp at murk and slime.
I see this but I don't refill the vase. They won't last much longer.
I change the shirt I had been wearing for two straight days, and the night in between.
And there it is -- the proof that they're alive.
But underneath that bright crown, brown begins to edge the green. Leaves curl and shrink into themselves. One petaled head trades satin for dry paper and bows out, exhaling something muskier than her sisters. The water is almost gone. They gulp at murk and slime.
I see this but I don't refill the vase. They won't last much longer.
I change the shirt I had been wearing for two straight days, and the night in between.
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
dripping
I'm on my knees. My eyes are level with hers. My face is wet.
A drop of water waits on my cheekbone for the right moment to fall and another skates the curve of my upper lip. I could taste it if I wanted to but I brush it away with the back of my hand.
It is not gone, though -- just spread out in a streak across my skin. How long until it evaporates into thin air?
She squeals and splashes the bathwater again. I am dripping. I am overcome.
A drop of water waits on my cheekbone for the right moment to fall and another skates the curve of my upper lip. I could taste it if I wanted to but I brush it away with the back of my hand.
It is not gone, though -- just spread out in a streak across my skin. How long until it evaporates into thin air?
She squeals and splashes the bathwater again. I am dripping. I am overcome.
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
statistics
She asks while I'm signing in, writing my name on the line. #2. We've already said the standard hellos and she's already inquired about my well being, twice: a crease unfolded, paint blobs pressed into the paper, symmetrical.
Hey, I was wondering: you have how many kids again?
I look up. I haven't written the last few letters of my last name so I hover above the paper. Four, I reply. This is a statistic that startles me, still.
And do you mind me asking -- how old are you?
I don't mind. I wonder about this myself sometimes. I see the lines around my mouth, my eyes. There are callouses on my feet, dead skin that I can peel with my fingernails if I dig hard enough. Sometimes I am so, so tired but I can't close my eyes because then another huge chunk of time will pass. I try to breathe evenly.
But I also know how she sees me. And it's not like that. I finish writing my name.
31, I reply.
Really? I would have guessed 25...you look so young...which is why I wondered how many kids you have because I thought you said four last time we talked but it just didn't make sense...
We both laugh. I tell her their ages and something about getting married in college and having kids right away, a little unexpected but not unwanted. My mouth keeps moving. She comments about how great it is that I can get away and come to yoga class. I heartily agree.
Now she knows everything about me.
Now she knows nothing about me.
Hey, I was wondering: you have how many kids again?
I look up. I haven't written the last few letters of my last name so I hover above the paper. Four, I reply. This is a statistic that startles me, still.
And do you mind me asking -- how old are you?
I don't mind. I wonder about this myself sometimes. I see the lines around my mouth, my eyes. There are callouses on my feet, dead skin that I can peel with my fingernails if I dig hard enough. Sometimes I am so, so tired but I can't close my eyes because then another huge chunk of time will pass. I try to breathe evenly.
But I also know how she sees me. And it's not like that. I finish writing my name.
31, I reply.
Really? I would have guessed 25...you look so young...which is why I wondered how many kids you have because I thought you said four last time we talked but it just didn't make sense...
We both laugh. I tell her their ages and something about getting married in college and having kids right away, a little unexpected but not unwanted. My mouth keeps moving. She comments about how great it is that I can get away and come to yoga class. I heartily agree.
Now she knows everything about me.
Now she knows nothing about me.
Monday, October 1, 2012
when she can't sleep
I press my forehead into the door frame, one foot in her bedroom, one in the hallway. This is not going as planned.
There's a wall in front of me and I don't see any footholds. It looks slick with precipitation. Or perspiration. Mine? Hers? My eyes are dead in their sockets. I let them rest on the floor.
The light from the living room flows down the hall. The fireplace cuts an angular shadow, a line between light and dark, a branch across the stream.
I don't look up for a long time. What's there to see, anyway? Me, making mistakes. Her, internalizing them.
The wood grain laps at my ankle. My foot sinks into the golden sand.
There's a wall in front of me and I don't see any footholds. It looks slick with precipitation. Or perspiration. Mine? Hers? My eyes are dead in their sockets. I let them rest on the floor.
The light from the living room flows down the hall. The fireplace cuts an angular shadow, a line between light and dark, a branch across the stream.
I don't look up for a long time. What's there to see, anyway? Me, making mistakes. Her, internalizing them.
The wood grain laps at my ankle. My foot sinks into the golden sand.
Friday, September 28, 2012
reflection
The bathroom light -- necessary but it throws flames into my eyes. I squint so hard it makes a sound.
The mirror -- unavoidable. I see my face through a crust of blurry vision. Mossy and far away. Pillow lines map the path the night has taken, all angles and straight edges. One intersects my eye. Later, at breakfast, she wonders if it's a scrape.
No, I tell her. But who knows, I think, how deep it really runs. I can't feel a thing.
The mirror -- unavoidable. I see my face through a crust of blurry vision. Mossy and far away. Pillow lines map the path the night has taken, all angles and straight edges. One intersects my eye. Later, at breakfast, she wonders if it's a scrape.
No, I tell her. But who knows, I think, how deep it really runs. I can't feel a thing.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
about an owl
The sun rolls over and pulls the cloud cover up to her neck. It's morning but she's not ready to get up.
I am, though. Ready. Despite the sleep stuck in the corners of my eyes. I open the door into the morning that pretends to be night. I haven't brushed my teeth and I'm wearing a winter cap over my sleep shuffled hair: the season has turned chilly, at least for today. For right now. The dog snuffs with anticipation or expectation or maybe just because the insides of her nostrils are shocked by the air temperature. It was just a few minutes ago that she was asleep with her nose tucked into her knee, like a bird without any wings.
Then out from the watery darkness comes a voice, stuttering over a single word, a flashlight beam flickering.
Who-who who?
I haven't heard him speak in so long. I didn't know how much I missed him. Where has he been living? Has he been talking to anyone else? Have they been able to answer? Do they understand the question?
I haven't been thinking about it at all, and now he's asking every day. There must be answers somewhere, under these layers of hair and skin and blood and bone but I'm afraid to open my mouth. The thing that comes out might not be words at all. A scream? Vomit? Nothing pretty. Or maybe a single exhale, a puff of breath, a wing shifting in the dark.
The dog is already at the bottom of the driveway, waiting. I inhale deeply and hold it, soaking my lungs in night. Ink fills the sponge.
I am, though. Ready. Despite the sleep stuck in the corners of my eyes. I open the door into the morning that pretends to be night. I haven't brushed my teeth and I'm wearing a winter cap over my sleep shuffled hair: the season has turned chilly, at least for today. For right now. The dog snuffs with anticipation or expectation or maybe just because the insides of her nostrils are shocked by the air temperature. It was just a few minutes ago that she was asleep with her nose tucked into her knee, like a bird without any wings.
Then out from the watery darkness comes a voice, stuttering over a single word, a flashlight beam flickering.
Who-who who?
I haven't heard him speak in so long. I didn't know how much I missed him. Where has he been living? Has he been talking to anyone else? Have they been able to answer? Do they understand the question?
I haven't been thinking about it at all, and now he's asking every day. There must be answers somewhere, under these layers of hair and skin and blood and bone but I'm afraid to open my mouth. The thing that comes out might not be words at all. A scream? Vomit? Nothing pretty. Or maybe a single exhale, a puff of breath, a wing shifting in the dark.
The dog is already at the bottom of the driveway, waiting. I inhale deeply and hold it, soaking my lungs in night. Ink fills the sponge.
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
flat
In my dream, I see an old friend. She smiles and her teeth are lasagna noodles. Pathetic, I mumble to my imagination. She dutifully shifts the scene. I see myself standing in Jurassic Park with a dog on a leash. I release the dog into an enclosed ring. Dog vs. raptor? Stupid, I sigh. But I let it unfold. In the dark I bandage a gushing neck. My hands are wet and warm.
I wake into daylight with eyes gummed and puffy. The fan oscillates, rippling the sheet that covers my legs. I see the pale blue sky through the curtain crack, through the trees. Smeary without my glasses.
***
I fall asleep on the couch, on my back, with my arms hugging my chest. They're sitting on the other end, huddled around the iPad, watching a video of their own making. I float above them. Their giggles echo from a tin can, far below me.
Someone brushes against my foot and pierces the pontoon supporting me. A gash through my skin. I slam into myself and open my eyes. They don't see me and there is no blood. Dizziness shrouds my head and it takes me a long time unwrap that stuffy gauze.
***
The half moon, she states from the back seat. I look away from the road and see it too. A circle cut in half with a stark center line, the dark side suggested. I could stare and stare but the ground is racing under my wheels and anything could jump from the shadows so it's just a glance and I'm back to watching the white dashed lines reel on by. It's beautiful, isn't it, I reply. That's all I can think to say.
***
I move slowly through the grass, eyes on the ground, hunting for dog poop. I hate it when they step in it.
A few steps and my toes are all wet, my sandals soaked. The grass is dark and cold. I imagine this condensation as drops squeezed out of the air during the night by thousands of invisible hands -- magical milk. Suddenly I want to lay in the dew. Roll around in it and drink it down. It will fill me.
And then I step in an overlooked pile. I finish the job and leave my shoes by the door. I'll deal with you later. I say it to myself, to the shoes.
I wake into daylight with eyes gummed and puffy. The fan oscillates, rippling the sheet that covers my legs. I see the pale blue sky through the curtain crack, through the trees. Smeary without my glasses.
***
I fall asleep on the couch, on my back, with my arms hugging my chest. They're sitting on the other end, huddled around the iPad, watching a video of their own making. I float above them. Their giggles echo from a tin can, far below me.
Someone brushes against my foot and pierces the pontoon supporting me. A gash through my skin. I slam into myself and open my eyes. They don't see me and there is no blood. Dizziness shrouds my head and it takes me a long time unwrap that stuffy gauze.
***
The half moon, she states from the back seat. I look away from the road and see it too. A circle cut in half with a stark center line, the dark side suggested. I could stare and stare but the ground is racing under my wheels and anything could jump from the shadows so it's just a glance and I'm back to watching the white dashed lines reel on by. It's beautiful, isn't it, I reply. That's all I can think to say.
***
I move slowly through the grass, eyes on the ground, hunting for dog poop. I hate it when they step in it.
A few steps and my toes are all wet, my sandals soaked. The grass is dark and cold. I imagine this condensation as drops squeezed out of the air during the night by thousands of invisible hands -- magical milk. Suddenly I want to lay in the dew. Roll around in it and drink it down. It will fill me.
And then I step in an overlooked pile. I finish the job and leave my shoes by the door. I'll deal with you later. I say it to myself, to the shoes.
Sunday, July 22, 2012
adapting
When she asks, it’s always at the wrong time: I’ve just
plunged my hands into the ground beef or I’m nursing the baby or I’m finally
eating lunch myself. Don’t forget to
check on the flower, Mama.
I tell her that I will. Just
remind me later, when I’m not in the middle of something.
It’s been a week since, inexplicably and at random, she went
outside on her own to pick that flower. A week since I sat down with just her
and unscrewed the wingnuts on my flower press, the one my dad made for me when
I was a kid. She helped me position the petals just so and nodded when I told
her we would check on it in a couple days when it had fully dried.
It will be too fragile
to play with or hold too much, I cautioned. But we could pick up some laminating paper and make it into a bookmark
or something. She nodded, serious and committed.
Now we’re running errands and I’m listing where we need to
go. Pick up the pictures we ordered. Buy
birthday cards for your cousins. Return books to the library. Get a gallon of
milk.
And laminating paper!
She calls from the back of the van. But I really can’t manage an extra stop.
One more in and out of the car, bucking and unbuckling, baby in the sling. Hold
hands. Look for cars.
Not this time,
sweetheart. Sorry. I can’t see her face in the rear view. I have to keep my
eyes on the road.
***
There’s an ache in my sternum sometimes. Right here, in the
bone that joins my ribs. I only feel it occasionally. Like when I’m easing the
sleep-heavy baby out of my arm. Or when I flop onto the couch after the final goodnight and lean to the right, sinking
all weight into my elbow. Or when I roll my shoulders down and back, filling my
lungs with air and pressing my heart forward. There it is, a twinge, deep in
the bone.
I think something in there must be clenched too tight.
***
The girl jogs past me. No, she’s a woman. Young, yes. But
taller than me. She moves fast. I don’t see her face.
Her ponytail hangs long and paints brushstrokes on the nape
of her bare neck. Her running shorts are loosely cut so they swish side to side
as she moves. She wears just a sports bra on top and I see the sweat shining on
her shoulders, her spine, and in beads down the small of her back.
The path curves her out of sight and by the time I reach the
straightaway she’s gone.
My feet feel heavy and hot inside my own running shoes. I
only lace them up for walking anymore. A couple months ago, I tried to pick up
running where I had left it in the winter when the holidays and my growing
pregnant belly crowded out possibility. But my body balked at the root of
things: ankles, Achilles, feet. So I walk. Baby on my chest, dog at my side.
The tall grasses that line the path rattle in the breeze,
brown and brittle. It hasn’t rained in a month. Things are lush along the stream,
but I haven’t gotten that far yet.
But here is something: some kind of weed, growing right at
the edge of the gravel. It’s stem is more like a stalk, thick as my thumb, and
it tops my shoulder. Its root must tap a source the grasses can’t touch.
***
The baby sleeps. I try to set her down but she senses the
shift. No one else is home so I indulge in this: I lay her down on my bed and
curl around her. With my pinkie in her mouth she stays asleep. The pad of my
finger rests on the roof of her mouth and she pulls hard with her tongue from
where she floats in the stream between awake and asleep. I close my eyes and go there too.
When I return to myself, there’s a cramp in my wrist and I
know I should start dinner and more than anything right now I’d rather be
reading a book. So I wiggle out of her grip. She stirs. I tense. I don’t want
to be stuck here.
But her hand comes to her face and finds her mouth. Reflex.
Instinct. She doesn’t part her lips but the surface tension parts and she slips
back down into the deep. I watch her breathe then ease myself out of the room.
***
I sit. My mind is an empty room, paneled with floor to
ceiling with windows, forming an octagonal shape. No, not octagonal…but…some other -agonal…one
that means: uncountable. I sit in the center of the room.
Outside the windows it’s black. Side to side, above, below.
Blacker than black. Delineated in space but part of space. I breathe and
breathe and breathe.
When I open my eyes I see my legs crossed in front of me.
The couch in shadow to my right.
If there’s a door to this room it doesn’t have a knob. But I
can still go through.
Monday, July 2, 2012
invisible
It's quiet. My thoughts tiptoe around the room on silent bare feet, nosing into all the corners, avoiding all the cobwebs. I follow them with my eyes.
It's dim. The curtains are drawn against the afternoon sun but it barges through the unmet seam and prints streaks across the ceiling. Shhhhhh, I whisper to the light. She's falling asleep. The baby rests her palm against my breast.
The shadows suck the life out of these spring colored walls. But the muted light illuminates a subtle topography and I can see subterranean things. Like strokes of drywall mudding and a hint of the studs behind it all, holding everything up. My eyes stop here. I close them. I don't have to speak incantations to conjure something up.
Two carpenters hammer this wall into being. One crouches low, cursing under his breath about nothing he wants to explain to me right now. Sweat darkens his shirt between his shoulder blades and I can see the outline of his wallet sunk in his back pocket. The other man works a lump of tobacco in his mouth, moving it to the other side of his jaw. He spits into the framework, staining the wood. He grips the board in front of him and looks up at the sun, estimating its progress. He's thinking about lunch. I wonder how much piss they built into these walls.
The baby's suckling slows and stops. She closes her lips. I'm not quite ready to put her down.
The air conditioning kicks on, changing the caliber of silence in the room. The curtains react to the moving air. My thoughts do, too.
I wonder what it was like for her, living here alone for forty-some years. Where did she place her potted plants? Against which wall did she sleep? Her skin cells are still in our duct work. Maybe her ghost drifts through sometimes, too.
I trace my thumb lightly across the baby's forehead and rest it between her eyes. I imagine an invisible fingerprint. She sighs in her sleep but does not wake.
It's dim. The curtains are drawn against the afternoon sun but it barges through the unmet seam and prints streaks across the ceiling. Shhhhhh, I whisper to the light. She's falling asleep. The baby rests her palm against my breast.
The shadows suck the life out of these spring colored walls. But the muted light illuminates a subtle topography and I can see subterranean things. Like strokes of drywall mudding and a hint of the studs behind it all, holding everything up. My eyes stop here. I close them. I don't have to speak incantations to conjure something up.
Two carpenters hammer this wall into being. One crouches low, cursing under his breath about nothing he wants to explain to me right now. Sweat darkens his shirt between his shoulder blades and I can see the outline of his wallet sunk in his back pocket. The other man works a lump of tobacco in his mouth, moving it to the other side of his jaw. He spits into the framework, staining the wood. He grips the board in front of him and looks up at the sun, estimating its progress. He's thinking about lunch. I wonder how much piss they built into these walls.
The baby's suckling slows and stops. She closes her lips. I'm not quite ready to put her down.
The air conditioning kicks on, changing the caliber of silence in the room. The curtains react to the moving air. My thoughts do, too.
I wonder what it was like for her, living here alone for forty-some years. Where did she place her potted plants? Against which wall did she sleep? Her skin cells are still in our duct work. Maybe her ghost drifts through sometimes, too.
I trace my thumb lightly across the baby's forehead and rest it between her eyes. I imagine an invisible fingerprint. She sighs in her sleep but does not wake.
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
bad dreams
It's dark. I close my eyes but they dart with determination despite the pressure of my lids and lashes. Thoughts bounce in my head like bingo balls. Ricocheting. Random. My muscles grip the shape of the day gone by. I can't sleep.
And then the motion stops and a picture materializes, dredged up like a memory but dripping with the mist of another world. Mine but not mine.
I see a familiar street. It's sunny. The green of the trees and the white of the opposite house and the mottled grey of the pavement stand out with a sharpness that hurts my eyes. I feel her small hand in mine, twisting and pushing and letting go. She runs.
Her figure and the car that crushes her blur and blend into one thing. My heart stops in real time. The blood drains from all my extremities and I expect to see hers on the street. Her blond curls are dark and damp.
My mouth doesn't open and my body can't move. I want to die.
But then I feel the real world firm against the one foot still anchored there and I force my eyes open. I have time to exhale once before she screams for real. I bolt out of bed.
Her eyes are still closed. She cries in her sleep, stuck in a dream that holds her just below the surface.
Her curls are damp. I touch her forehead and her hand -- she's warm all over. The air is close and hot.
I carry her to the living room and stand her next to the laundry basket. She's quiet now, wavering and nearly asleep. I feel my way through the unfolded clothing for something cooler. A tank top, anything. I finally find a sleeveless dress and call that good enough.
I pull the too-hot nightgown over her head and she instinctively lifts her arms. I thread her head and arms through the dress and carry her back to her room. She rests on my shoulder. I ease her onto her pillow and she's asleep before I finish adjusting the fan to oscillate in her direction.
I watch her chest rise and fall. I wait for my breath to match hers. I go back to bed.
The ceiling is black and blank. I don't close my eyes.
Then I finally do.
In the morning, the sun trickles through the trees and puddles in the house. She smiles into the kitchen. I hug her hello.
And then the motion stops and a picture materializes, dredged up like a memory but dripping with the mist of another world. Mine but not mine.
I see a familiar street. It's sunny. The green of the trees and the white of the opposite house and the mottled grey of the pavement stand out with a sharpness that hurts my eyes. I feel her small hand in mine, twisting and pushing and letting go. She runs.
Her figure and the car that crushes her blur and blend into one thing. My heart stops in real time. The blood drains from all my extremities and I expect to see hers on the street. Her blond curls are dark and damp.
My mouth doesn't open and my body can't move. I want to die.
But then I feel the real world firm against the one foot still anchored there and I force my eyes open. I have time to exhale once before she screams for real. I bolt out of bed.
Her eyes are still closed. She cries in her sleep, stuck in a dream that holds her just below the surface.
Her curls are damp. I touch her forehead and her hand -- she's warm all over. The air is close and hot.
I carry her to the living room and stand her next to the laundry basket. She's quiet now, wavering and nearly asleep. I feel my way through the unfolded clothing for something cooler. A tank top, anything. I finally find a sleeveless dress and call that good enough.
I pull the too-hot nightgown over her head and she instinctively lifts her arms. I thread her head and arms through the dress and carry her back to her room. She rests on my shoulder. I ease her onto her pillow and she's asleep before I finish adjusting the fan to oscillate in her direction.
I watch her chest rise and fall. I wait for my breath to match hers. I go back to bed.
The ceiling is black and blank. I don't close my eyes.
Then I finally do.
In the morning, the sun trickles through the trees and puddles in the house. She smiles into the kitchen. I hug her hello.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
fishing
I walk the dog at dusk. No sunlight slants through the trees at this
hour. Shadows cover the path. Gnats thicken the air and I can't see them
until I'm within their cloud and one catches in the corner of my eye. A
tear blurs my vision. I press the heel of my palm against my eyelid and
stop still. I blink and blink and blink. When I brush my cheek the bug
sticks to my finger, black and immobile, drowned in holy water. I wipe it on my sleeve and walk on.
***
I've been reading this book about writing, and it's making me almost as happy as actually writing something myself. Almost. The author's best advice is to just write because you might pour out six pages of crap before you find that one, glinting gem of a sentence that was the whole point of the thing and never would have bubbled to the surface if you didn't decant all that froth from the top first. So I woke up early this morning and felt awake and alive for once so I'm sitting here with my cup of coffee and the single pen that I keep chasing around the house and a wrinkled scrap of paper because my real notebook is lost, it's been so long since I opened it. I want to say something about a moment from yesterday before the days dilute it and its spreads out all over my memory, blended into one million other moments that look exactly the same.
I pause because I don't know how to start. It's so ordinary. How can I paint a picture that shivers with beauty the way it does behind my eyes? It was an unremarkable day, a deep breath after the crescendo of busy-ness that was last week. The two middle girls wanted to swing so that's what we did. They laughed big crazy belly laughs and the baby watched the back and forth with wide eyes. Wise eyes. She knew what was going on. The air was just the right temperature and the breeze moved only slightly and not a single bug landed on my skin. My hands pressed into the littler one's back and she moved away and back, away and back and I was part of that pendulum rhythm without even thinking about it. The older one said the swing was her broomstick and hers could fly higher. Her sister echoed her laughter, flying high too but not understanding that -er as a suffix meant she was being out done.
One hundred years from now, none of this will matter. This is a truth I've been telling myself in moments of crisis or chaos or frustration or fatigue and it helps. But this sentence in my hands right now cuts my skin and I bleed. I'm the only witness to this moment that matters only to me and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow will bury it completely and I won't even remember the gold around its edges.
This makes my throat ache so that I think I might cry or scream or throw up and the only thing I can do is open my mouth wide and shove all of it down down down and try to remember the taste as it passes over my tongue. Maybe later I can dangle some fishing line past my teeth and hook some beautiful words like dappled and ephemeral and they will drip with holy water when I dangle them in front of my eyes. They'll reflect the light as if from within and line up in a perfect frame around something profound.
Maybe.
***
She takes off ahead of me, school bag bouncing against her back, bare legs flying. She always gets the mail after school. I think she likes that moment of anticipation when her fingers just touch the handle and the door still hides the contents and there might be something inside with her name on it. I am dear friends what that kind of hope.
The huge pine in our yard points like a finger at the heavens and drapes a skirt of shade across the grass. But I walk through a pleat of sun half a street behind. I balance the baby against my chest and she blinks and squints at the world over my shoulder -- eyes in the back of my head. A cloud of gnats hover in a strange, concentrated column just next to the road and the sun glints off their individual bodies -- internally illuminated points of light traveling in crazy, unchartable orbits, tethered by force or choice to an unseen center.
I see her drop half the mail so I hurry to help pick it up. It's all catalogs and advertisements. Junk. I toss it in the recycle bin as we walk inside and for a single second I wonder where it will be born again.
***
I've been reading this book about writing, and it's making me almost as happy as actually writing something myself. Almost. The author's best advice is to just write because you might pour out six pages of crap before you find that one, glinting gem of a sentence that was the whole point of the thing and never would have bubbled to the surface if you didn't decant all that froth from the top first. So I woke up early this morning and felt awake and alive for once so I'm sitting here with my cup of coffee and the single pen that I keep chasing around the house and a wrinkled scrap of paper because my real notebook is lost, it's been so long since I opened it. I want to say something about a moment from yesterday before the days dilute it and its spreads out all over my memory, blended into one million other moments that look exactly the same.
I pause because I don't know how to start. It's so ordinary. How can I paint a picture that shivers with beauty the way it does behind my eyes? It was an unremarkable day, a deep breath after the crescendo of busy-ness that was last week. The two middle girls wanted to swing so that's what we did. They laughed big crazy belly laughs and the baby watched the back and forth with wide eyes. Wise eyes. She knew what was going on. The air was just the right temperature and the breeze moved only slightly and not a single bug landed on my skin. My hands pressed into the littler one's back and she moved away and back, away and back and I was part of that pendulum rhythm without even thinking about it. The older one said the swing was her broomstick and hers could fly higher. Her sister echoed her laughter, flying high too but not understanding that -er as a suffix meant she was being out done.
One hundred years from now, none of this will matter. This is a truth I've been telling myself in moments of crisis or chaos or frustration or fatigue and it helps. But this sentence in my hands right now cuts my skin and I bleed. I'm the only witness to this moment that matters only to me and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow will bury it completely and I won't even remember the gold around its edges.
This makes my throat ache so that I think I might cry or scream or throw up and the only thing I can do is open my mouth wide and shove all of it down down down and try to remember the taste as it passes over my tongue. Maybe later I can dangle some fishing line past my teeth and hook some beautiful words like dappled and ephemeral and they will drip with holy water when I dangle them in front of my eyes. They'll reflect the light as if from within and line up in a perfect frame around something profound.
Maybe.
***
She takes off ahead of me, school bag bouncing against her back, bare legs flying. She always gets the mail after school. I think she likes that moment of anticipation when her fingers just touch the handle and the door still hides the contents and there might be something inside with her name on it. I am dear friends what that kind of hope.
The huge pine in our yard points like a finger at the heavens and drapes a skirt of shade across the grass. But I walk through a pleat of sun half a street behind. I balance the baby against my chest and she blinks and squints at the world over my shoulder -- eyes in the back of my head. A cloud of gnats hover in a strange, concentrated column just next to the road and the sun glints off their individual bodies -- internally illuminated points of light traveling in crazy, unchartable orbits, tethered by force or choice to an unseen center.
I see her drop half the mail so I hurry to help pick it up. It's all catalogs and advertisements. Junk. I toss it in the recycle bin as we walk inside and for a single second I wonder where it will be born again.
Friday, May 11, 2012
wishes
I have one foot outside. My hip holds the door open and I stoop to clip the dog's harness to her chain. My eyes follow her out the door, an arc of movement. Something in the cuff of my jeans catches my attention. I don't stand up.
The dark material is coarse under my fingertips. I unfold it. Dandelion seeds cling to me.
I brush them off in a single exhale and they latch onto an unseen breeze, skirting across the concrete step and away from me, born into the air on a whispered wish. They blend into the air. Gone.
Someone says my name. Mama?
I straighten and step back into the house. Back to making dinner. Back to them. Back to sewing another patch into the parachutes on their backs.
The dark material is coarse under my fingertips. I unfold it. Dandelion seeds cling to me.
I brush them off in a single exhale and they latch onto an unseen breeze, skirting across the concrete step and away from me, born into the air on a whispered wish. They blend into the air. Gone.
Someone says my name. Mama?
I straighten and step back into the house. Back to making dinner. Back to them. Back to sewing another patch into the parachutes on their backs.
Monday, May 7, 2012
footprints in the sand
I was eighteen when I got the tattoo. It was a premeditated whim but not entirely out of character. I've always liked the idea of
something under the surface, hidden from view, with roots even deeper
than a layer of skin. Something that won't rub off.
It was a mark with a vaguely defined meaning. Something about walking with someone you love? Or maybe about running really, really fast? Open for interpretation. That the years might alter it -- might pull on it, might stretch it further -- never crossed my mind.
Today, it means this:
Their voices bubble up from the basement. Their bodies burst into the living room. I watch from the sidelines.
They ricochet down the hallway in high heels, in slippers, in slapping bare feet. I'm wearing my bathrobe.
Their bedroom door slams. The walls muffle their noise. I press my coffee cup to my forehead, to the grooves that are growing there between my brows. I close my eyes.
I imagine the hallway lined with sand. I see their footprints, divots one on top of the other, impossible to follow. Volatile in the wind. Nothing in the rain.
I get down on my knees and cup my hands around the places they've been.
It was a mark with a vaguely defined meaning. Something about walking with someone you love? Or maybe about running really, really fast? Open for interpretation. That the years might alter it -- might pull on it, might stretch it further -- never crossed my mind.
Today, it means this:
Their voices bubble up from the basement. Their bodies burst into the living room. I watch from the sidelines.
They ricochet down the hallway in high heels, in slippers, in slapping bare feet. I'm wearing my bathrobe.
Their bedroom door slams. The walls muffle their noise. I press my coffee cup to my forehead, to the grooves that are growing there between my brows. I close my eyes.
I imagine the hallway lined with sand. I see their footprints, divots one on top of the other, impossible to follow. Volatile in the wind. Nothing in the rain.
I get down on my knees and cup my hands around the places they've been.
Friday, April 27, 2012
balance
I wake with an ache threaded through my jaw on one side. Its tight and hard to move. My mouth must have been hanging open, slack and slanted sideways under sleep that dragged me down too deep and pulled me to the surface too fast. That's the most dangerous way to dive.
I sit up and pull on my socks, first one and then the other. I open and close my mouth until the two sides even out and by the time I make it to the kitchen, my jaw is loose enough to let my lips form the shape of good morning. My voice catches, dry and unused and unfamiliar in my ears.
***
I am asymmetrical. There's no way to fold me so my edges line up.
Just look. My right eye is smaller than the left. I'm missing a rib on one side. One breast feeds my baby better than the other and when I sweat I swear my right armpit smells stronger. My waistline feels thicker on the right when I'm sitting and one foot is bigger than the other.
These imbalances are branded into my blueprint. But they don't bother me. I can still stand up straight.
***
With a handful of birdseed, we call the chickens back to their coop. She laughs as they run toward us, moving fast and low and ridiculous.
They look so funny, like they could just fall right over.
I agree. There's something about two legs and no arms and wings folded back that looks unbalanced. But their anatomy doesn't fail them and they can't hear us laugh.
***
I'm out for a walk -- baby in the sling, dog on the leash, everyone else at home. Silence moves through the trees and cools my cheeks. The spring air is damp in my lungs.
I pass a woman walking the other way and we exchange the usual smile and hello.
You have your hands full! she adds.
She has no idea. My arms and chest and head are so loaded with blessings that my spine bends under it all. I'm surprised she can't see that.
Or maybe that's what she meant.
***
The night she came is wrapped tightly in webs of memory. Some details melt together but other moments stand still, framed and flash frozen in my mind.
Like this:
I walk through the door, my vision tunneled. I stop. I see only him.
She's sweeping my legs out from under me and I wrap my arms around his shoulders. I know I'm probably pressing against him too hard but he doesn't flinch. My forehead touches his shirt.
I breathe him in and he balances me.
***
Now his hand on my shoulder surprises me. That's where her head usually rests.
More than two voices aimed at me can shoot me down.
Milk on the floor brings me to my knees.
Making dinner is a mountain.
He tells me I should go to yoga class but I don't feel like it. A movie is too long and words on a page swim and blur before I can finish a chapter. This is the only thing I can write about. It's not time away that I need.
***
Their game is somewhat quiet. The baby is happy in her bouncy chair. I sit on the floor in the living room surrounded by them. The evening light dims.
He stands in the kitchen and the light above the sink holds him in a soft spotlight. His back is to me as he does the dishes. He talks.
What he says is ordinary. Everyday. But his voice walks across the room, threading together in strands that become solid, a ballet bar above my head. I reach up and find it, memorizing its position so I can find it tomorrow when all the lights are on and I'm trying to stand one foot, practicing balance.
I sit up and pull on my socks, first one and then the other. I open and close my mouth until the two sides even out and by the time I make it to the kitchen, my jaw is loose enough to let my lips form the shape of good morning. My voice catches, dry and unused and unfamiliar in my ears.
***
I am asymmetrical. There's no way to fold me so my edges line up.
Just look. My right eye is smaller than the left. I'm missing a rib on one side. One breast feeds my baby better than the other and when I sweat I swear my right armpit smells stronger. My waistline feels thicker on the right when I'm sitting and one foot is bigger than the other.
These imbalances are branded into my blueprint. But they don't bother me. I can still stand up straight.
***
With a handful of birdseed, we call the chickens back to their coop. She laughs as they run toward us, moving fast and low and ridiculous.
They look so funny, like they could just fall right over.
I agree. There's something about two legs and no arms and wings folded back that looks unbalanced. But their anatomy doesn't fail them and they can't hear us laugh.
***
I'm out for a walk -- baby in the sling, dog on the leash, everyone else at home. Silence moves through the trees and cools my cheeks. The spring air is damp in my lungs.
I pass a woman walking the other way and we exchange the usual smile and hello.
You have your hands full! she adds.
She has no idea. My arms and chest and head are so loaded with blessings that my spine bends under it all. I'm surprised she can't see that.
Or maybe that's what she meant.
***
The night she came is wrapped tightly in webs of memory. Some details melt together but other moments stand still, framed and flash frozen in my mind.
Like this:
I walk through the door, my vision tunneled. I stop. I see only him.
She's sweeping my legs out from under me and I wrap my arms around his shoulders. I know I'm probably pressing against him too hard but he doesn't flinch. My forehead touches his shirt.
I breathe him in and he balances me.
***
Now his hand on my shoulder surprises me. That's where her head usually rests.
More than two voices aimed at me can shoot me down.
Milk on the floor brings me to my knees.
Making dinner is a mountain.
He tells me I should go to yoga class but I don't feel like it. A movie is too long and words on a page swim and blur before I can finish a chapter. This is the only thing I can write about. It's not time away that I need.
***
Their game is somewhat quiet. The baby is happy in her bouncy chair. I sit on the floor in the living room surrounded by them. The evening light dims.
He stands in the kitchen and the light above the sink holds him in a soft spotlight. His back is to me as he does the dishes. He talks.
What he says is ordinary. Everyday. But his voice walks across the room, threading together in strands that become solid, a ballet bar above my head. I reach up and find it, memorizing its position so I can find it tomorrow when all the lights are on and I'm trying to stand one foot, practicing balance.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
separate
5.
Mama, can you iron this?
I'm busy right now but she lives in this moment. Only this one. And she wants to hold it in her hands. That's something I can understand.
I turn on the iron and wait for it to warm. Too much heat and I'll ruin what she made. Not enough and the pieces will separate. The ready light turns green. I slide the iron across the beads. They melt just enough.
It turns out.
***
0.
I press my cheek against the top of her head. She warms my skin. She doesn't know it yet, but a fire burns within her.
I only have to angle my neck slightly to tuck her entire skull under my chin. Her bones are solid, shielding from the world the map to who she'll become. But they're also so fragile: still soft, still separated. For now, she is incomplete without me.
I cup my hands around her flame, wings against the world.
***
2.
She was the littlest. I carried her a lot. She sat on my lap. I stroked the soft skin on the backs of her hands. I breathed deeply into her hair.
Overnight everything changed.
Now she holds my hand. Sits next to me. Close but separate.
She smiles a lot but she also pushes hard. She's looking for her place. And there's something within me that pushes back. I feel singed and raw. She is fire when I'm craving snow.
But tomorrow it's supposed to rain.
***
7.
I'm so mad at you. I'm never talking to you again for the rest of my life. Her tone is serious. Cutting.
I raise my eyebrows and pause to swallow. Once. Twice. Both sad and snarky boil in the back of my throat and it takes me a second to separate logic from emotion. I have to pry it loose, strand by strand.
I'm sorry to hear that. I have to say something or she tells me you don't even care. I'm feeling my way through the dark.
By the time she's a teenager, maybe I'll be able to see shadows -- the outlines of shapes, of roots exposed -- before I catch my toe on a corner and fall flat on my face.
***
Are those your regular jeans?
Yep.
Wow. You look great! You're lucky.
Lucky or not, this is just how it is for me. My pregnant form fades easily. My body is elastic.
Except it's not.
I'm in the dark, in bed, lying on my back. I press my fingers into my abdomen and feel how the muscles are separate, a valley that starts and my navel and runs up to my diaphragm. I know I've come undone in ways that cannot be stitched up.
But there's something behind my naval, too. A fire deep inside my belly. It might be flickering right now but it hasn't gone out. And it can be stoked. It can always be stoked.
I know how.
Sunday, April 15, 2012
where I get random
Sarah, who writes at the blog This Heavenly Life tagged me in a meme last week. The object of this little game is to post 11 random things about yourself, answer the 11 questions posed by the tagger, create 11 new questions, and tag other bloggers. I've been thinking about it ever since. While I loved reading Sarah's post and finding out more about her, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to come up with a response clever enough to be worth posting.
But I wanted to write something. So I decided the only place to start is where I'm at.
1. It's dusk. Dinner is done and I took on dish-duty, specifically for the chance to stand up straight. I've been holding the baby all day. She weighs down on me. But I step outside to bring in the laundry first. The light is fading and I have two arms free.
It's mostly his clothing in this load. I unpin a blue shirt. I'll need to iron this one. I fold it in half but hold it up to my face before putting it in the basket. It smells like the breeze that's been blowing all day, spring marinated into the fibers, but it still smells like him. This is why I don't use scented laundry detergent.
The air smells significant, too. Smokey, but not the wood stove smoke of the cold weather months. This is the campfire scent of summer, speaking of humid evenings, of roasted marshmallows, of ash soaring high above the flames. A neighbor must be burning a bonfire.
2. It reminds me of another time and place of a similar smell, bonfires all around. It was a Civil War reenactment. I was part of a "crowd control" crew, walking around the grounds with my Americorps NCCC team members, mostly just picking up cigarette butts and trying to look busy while taking in the sights and sounds and smells of a different time period brought to life. There were costumes and tents and weapons, food and animals and bonfires. I can't remember exactly where we were -- 11 years have elapsed since then and we saw so many places during our 10 months of service, traveling here and there in the southeast -- but this moment, taking laundry from the line, smelling the bonfire, reminds me that:
3. That year in NCCC was probably one of the hardest of my life. I was away from home, away from everything familiar, in a way that I hadn't experienced yet, even during my first couple years in college. I already knew I was an introvert, safe only in small circles (I had only attended one college party -- I walked in, looked at the crowd, and walked back out. It was coffee shops and libraries for me), but working and living so closely with a whole new group of people was something far, far out of my comfort zone. I had to work hard to hold myself together.
4. But it was also one of the most important years of my life, too. I learned so much. About myself. About the people and ideas outside my little world. But more than that, it pointed me home. Back to the Midwest, to my roots, to my family. But also to him. He would always be my front door.
5. He asked me to marry him during that year, when I was home for a weekend break. It was a bike ride in our home town, a stop by a river, him down on one knee, the ring. My mouth hanging open. Yes. And before we rode home -- on our bikes, on our joy and hopes and dreams -- I stopped to pick up a stone. It sits in my jewelery box, more valuable than any gem. Maybe someday it will be the first bit of earth I'm buried under.
6. When I was a kid, I buried a time capsule in my yard with a friend (how old were we, Anna?). I remember writing down various facts about ourselves, such as what we were wearing that day. It was my idea for each of us to also disclose one "secret" into the capsule. We intended to leave the jar underground for years, but it lasted a few months at best. When we unearthed it, my "secret" was this: I'm wearing a bra! I certainly did not need one.
7. I did not need one after my last kid weaned, either. This is not something that has ever bothered me.
8. Speaking of kids, you know how I have four? In many cases, mothering that many would mean that in general, I'm good with them. That I like them. Actually -- um -- not so much. I'm somewhat afraid of them. The idea of chaperoning school trips or volunteering in the classroom sends me into small fits of anxiety. This is true. And likely largely due to the fact that:
9. People in general scare me. In most cases, unless I know everyone going, I'd rather stay home. Nowadays, I have many excuses to stay home. But that was not always so. (See #3). And I have a hunch that as my girls get older, I'll have to come out of my shell to allow them to come out of theirs. I try not to think about that.
10. I don't think of myself as a good conversationalist. I'm not entertaining or animated. I'm better one-on-one than in a group, and I express myself better through writing than speaking. But I'd never call myself witty or funny. And you'll always win a debate against me. I'll only tell you about my religious views if I don't feel like you're trying to sell me yours, and I'd rather fold laundry than discuss politics.
11. Actually, there are a lot of things about laundry that I like. And I'd probably stay out here longer, taking these things down slowly, if the bugs weren't biting me...
And now, to answer Sarah's questions...
1. Do you always read the entire book once you get started, or have you ever stopped halfway through a book? If so, what was it, and why?
I usually finish. But I quit Lord of the Rings before I got past the first hundred pages. There was too much description and I had laundry to fold...
2. Which would you prefer to spend an afternoon doing: painting with a room full of preschoolers or painting with a group of adults?
Isn't is obvious? Neither. I'd rather if the room was empty.
3. Is there a television show on right now that you try to never miss? What is it?
Nope. I rarely choose to watch TV. I'd rather read. Or write. Or do yoga. Or stare out the window....
4. What is the most adventurous food item you've ever tried?
I will try anything. Unless it spent any part of its life underwater.
5. If you could have as many children as you wanted without fear of discomfort (either physical or financial) or social judgement, how many do you think you'd have?
I think I'm at my limit right now...
6. What foreign culture fascinates you the most?
I will read any book about any group of people and find it interesting. I don't have an itch to travel, though. At least not right now.
7. When you're grocery shopping, what snack item has the greatest ability to tempt you into an unnecessary purchase?
Chocolate. Enough said.
8. When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? Did you succeed?
An author. I'm working on it.
9. If you could go back to school and get any degree, would you choose differently than you did the first time?
I started in engineering and switched to English after two years. So yes -- I would have started in English so that I could have taken more classes in my major. I would have taken more creative writing classes as well.
10. You have a $500 gift card to the closest mall: what will you spend it on?
Clothing, please. But can I shop online?
11. You are headed into a party full of people you've never met before and where mingling is expected. What one word describes your mindset as you open the door?
I think, by now, you must know my answer. GETMEOUTOFHERE. Can that count as one word?
***
Next, I'm supposed to come up with 11 new questions and tag other bloggers. But I'm tired. So this is as far as I go. But if you want to leave me a comment with some random facts about yourself, the floor is yours.
But I wanted to write something. So I decided the only place to start is where I'm at.
1. It's dusk. Dinner is done and I took on dish-duty, specifically for the chance to stand up straight. I've been holding the baby all day. She weighs down on me. But I step outside to bring in the laundry first. The light is fading and I have two arms free.
It's mostly his clothing in this load. I unpin a blue shirt. I'll need to iron this one. I fold it in half but hold it up to my face before putting it in the basket. It smells like the breeze that's been blowing all day, spring marinated into the fibers, but it still smells like him. This is why I don't use scented laundry detergent.
The air smells significant, too. Smokey, but not the wood stove smoke of the cold weather months. This is the campfire scent of summer, speaking of humid evenings, of roasted marshmallows, of ash soaring high above the flames. A neighbor must be burning a bonfire.
2. It reminds me of another time and place of a similar smell, bonfires all around. It was a Civil War reenactment. I was part of a "crowd control" crew, walking around the grounds with my Americorps NCCC team members, mostly just picking up cigarette butts and trying to look busy while taking in the sights and sounds and smells of a different time period brought to life. There were costumes and tents and weapons, food and animals and bonfires. I can't remember exactly where we were -- 11 years have elapsed since then and we saw so many places during our 10 months of service, traveling here and there in the southeast -- but this moment, taking laundry from the line, smelling the bonfire, reminds me that:
3. That year in NCCC was probably one of the hardest of my life. I was away from home, away from everything familiar, in a way that I hadn't experienced yet, even during my first couple years in college. I already knew I was an introvert, safe only in small circles (I had only attended one college party -- I walked in, looked at the crowd, and walked back out. It was coffee shops and libraries for me), but working and living so closely with a whole new group of people was something far, far out of my comfort zone. I had to work hard to hold myself together.
4. But it was also one of the most important years of my life, too. I learned so much. About myself. About the people and ideas outside my little world. But more than that, it pointed me home. Back to the Midwest, to my roots, to my family. But also to him. He would always be my front door.
5. He asked me to marry him during that year, when I was home for a weekend break. It was a bike ride in our home town, a stop by a river, him down on one knee, the ring. My mouth hanging open. Yes. And before we rode home -- on our bikes, on our joy and hopes and dreams -- I stopped to pick up a stone. It sits in my jewelery box, more valuable than any gem. Maybe someday it will be the first bit of earth I'm buried under.
6. When I was a kid, I buried a time capsule in my yard with a friend (how old were we, Anna?). I remember writing down various facts about ourselves, such as what we were wearing that day. It was my idea for each of us to also disclose one "secret" into the capsule. We intended to leave the jar underground for years, but it lasted a few months at best. When we unearthed it, my "secret" was this: I'm wearing a bra! I certainly did not need one.
7. I did not need one after my last kid weaned, either. This is not something that has ever bothered me.
8. Speaking of kids, you know how I have four? In many cases, mothering that many would mean that in general, I'm good with them. That I like them. Actually -- um -- not so much. I'm somewhat afraid of them. The idea of chaperoning school trips or volunteering in the classroom sends me into small fits of anxiety. This is true. And likely largely due to the fact that:
9. People in general scare me. In most cases, unless I know everyone going, I'd rather stay home. Nowadays, I have many excuses to stay home. But that was not always so. (See #3). And I have a hunch that as my girls get older, I'll have to come out of my shell to allow them to come out of theirs. I try not to think about that.
10. I don't think of myself as a good conversationalist. I'm not entertaining or animated. I'm better one-on-one than in a group, and I express myself better through writing than speaking. But I'd never call myself witty or funny. And you'll always win a debate against me. I'll only tell you about my religious views if I don't feel like you're trying to sell me yours, and I'd rather fold laundry than discuss politics.
11. Actually, there are a lot of things about laundry that I like. And I'd probably stay out here longer, taking these things down slowly, if the bugs weren't biting me...
And now, to answer Sarah's questions...
1. Do you always read the entire book once you get started, or have you ever stopped halfway through a book? If so, what was it, and why?
I usually finish. But I quit Lord of the Rings before I got past the first hundred pages. There was too much description and I had laundry to fold...
2. Which would you prefer to spend an afternoon doing: painting with a room full of preschoolers or painting with a group of adults?
Isn't is obvious? Neither. I'd rather if the room was empty.
3. Is there a television show on right now that you try to never miss? What is it?
Nope. I rarely choose to watch TV. I'd rather read. Or write. Or do yoga. Or stare out the window....
4. What is the most adventurous food item you've ever tried?
I will try anything. Unless it spent any part of its life underwater.
5. If you could have as many children as you wanted without fear of discomfort (either physical or financial) or social judgement, how many do you think you'd have?
I think I'm at my limit right now...
6. What foreign culture fascinates you the most?
I will read any book about any group of people and find it interesting. I don't have an itch to travel, though. At least not right now.
7. When you're grocery shopping, what snack item has the greatest ability to tempt you into an unnecessary purchase?
Chocolate. Enough said.
8. When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? Did you succeed?
An author. I'm working on it.
9. If you could go back to school and get any degree, would you choose differently than you did the first time?
I started in engineering and switched to English after two years. So yes -- I would have started in English so that I could have taken more classes in my major. I would have taken more creative writing classes as well.
10. You have a $500 gift card to the closest mall: what will you spend it on?
Clothing, please. But can I shop online?
11. You are headed into a party full of people you've never met before and where mingling is expected. What one word describes your mindset as you open the door?
I think, by now, you must know my answer. GETMEOUTOFHERE. Can that count as one word?
***
Next, I'm supposed to come up with 11 new questions and tag other bloggers. But I'm tired. So this is as far as I go. But if you want to leave me a comment with some random facts about yourself, the floor is yours.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
the point
Mommy, they won't let me play.
She turns her whole body toward him, her shoulders square with his.
Hm, well what did they say?
They just say 'no' whenever I ask. She hears what he says but knows what's under the surface, too.
That must have made you feel really sad. She holds her hand out to him. I'll go back with you and see if we can figure something out.
Our conversation evaporates into wispy clouds that dissipate when she walks through them on her way out of the room. But I'm not thinking about that. I'm thinking about her tone and her choice of words and her patience and her empathy and I'm opening my mouth to catch all those cool flakes on my tongue so I can cough them up at the right moments. But they melt on contact. I don't even get to swallow.
I've been running too hot lately and I know it. I feel it in my mouth.
***
The mirror is full length. I am in my underwear.
I'm about to take the dress from its hanger (ignoring the price tag for now) but I stop. I let my arms hang at my sides.
I see angles and edges because that's what I am. What I always have been. But there's also a softness to my belly, new but not really. I don't wrinkle my nose or wish it away. It's gentleness, underneath everything, when I don't feel gentle at all.
I wiggle into the dress. It's tight and stripey and somehow highlights both the sharp and the soft and I look wrong all over. Unbalanced.
I buy a hoodie instead. It's red-orange like the sun when it's going down, with thumb-holes so I can slouch the sleeves over my wrists and hide halfway down my palms. I get cold in the summer sometimes, too.
***
What do you think is the point of life?
Its an abrupt shift in conversation but it doesn't surprise me. This is how we've always talked.
My instant answer is this: survival.
But its more than that. Or I wouldn't.
I gesture to my baby in her arms. My second answer: procreation, of course.
But animals do that, too. That's not enough.
Could it be this? Finding beauty in everything. In the good stuff. And in the rock hard places, too.
***
I'm driving home. I was out. Alone.
I sit crookedly in the driver's seat, leaning to the right under the weight of a baby not on my shoulder. Hunched forward over a full belly now deflated.
The radio fills the silence and my empty head. But I turn it off the second I see the moon. It hovers low and luminary, humongous and completely impossible. The air feels charged and sacred. It can only hold silence.
When I pull into the driveway, the moon disappears behind the too-big houses down the street. I go inside. It's getting late -- at least for me. Sleep pulls at the corners of my eyes and accelerates the rust grinding deep within my joints.
The night grows longer.
The baby won't settle.
Liquid frustration fills my brain and swims into my eyes. I sit in the rocking chair by the front window. I blink. The moon is higher. Smaller. Somehow even brighter. But tucked behind the half-full branches.
I lean my head back and close my eyes against the darkness of the room and her open eyes. When I open them again the moon is above the trees and I can see its face completely.
It is full.
So am I.
She turns her whole body toward him, her shoulders square with his.
Hm, well what did they say?
They just say 'no' whenever I ask. She hears what he says but knows what's under the surface, too.
That must have made you feel really sad. She holds her hand out to him. I'll go back with you and see if we can figure something out.
Our conversation evaporates into wispy clouds that dissipate when she walks through them on her way out of the room. But I'm not thinking about that. I'm thinking about her tone and her choice of words and her patience and her empathy and I'm opening my mouth to catch all those cool flakes on my tongue so I can cough them up at the right moments. But they melt on contact. I don't even get to swallow.
I've been running too hot lately and I know it. I feel it in my mouth.
***
The mirror is full length. I am in my underwear.
I'm about to take the dress from its hanger (ignoring the price tag for now) but I stop. I let my arms hang at my sides.
I see angles and edges because that's what I am. What I always have been. But there's also a softness to my belly, new but not really. I don't wrinkle my nose or wish it away. It's gentleness, underneath everything, when I don't feel gentle at all.
I wiggle into the dress. It's tight and stripey and somehow highlights both the sharp and the soft and I look wrong all over. Unbalanced.
I buy a hoodie instead. It's red-orange like the sun when it's going down, with thumb-holes so I can slouch the sleeves over my wrists and hide halfway down my palms. I get cold in the summer sometimes, too.
***
What do you think is the point of life?
Its an abrupt shift in conversation but it doesn't surprise me. This is how we've always talked.
My instant answer is this: survival.
But its more than that. Or I wouldn't.
I gesture to my baby in her arms. My second answer: procreation, of course.
But animals do that, too. That's not enough.
Could it be this? Finding beauty in everything. In the good stuff. And in the rock hard places, too.
***
I'm driving home. I was out. Alone.
I sit crookedly in the driver's seat, leaning to the right under the weight of a baby not on my shoulder. Hunched forward over a full belly now deflated.
The radio fills the silence and my empty head. But I turn it off the second I see the moon. It hovers low and luminary, humongous and completely impossible. The air feels charged and sacred. It can only hold silence.
When I pull into the driveway, the moon disappears behind the too-big houses down the street. I go inside. It's getting late -- at least for me. Sleep pulls at the corners of my eyes and accelerates the rust grinding deep within my joints.
The night grows longer.
The baby won't settle.
Liquid frustration fills my brain and swims into my eyes. I sit in the rocking chair by the front window. I blink. The moon is higher. Smaller. Somehow even brighter. But tucked behind the half-full branches.
I lean my head back and close my eyes against the darkness of the room and her open eyes. When I open them again the moon is above the trees and I can see its face completely.
It is full.
So am I.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)