Grace

The tenuous physicality of motherhood

This is my every morning.  I park the car, we walk into school, first to Whit’s building, and then to Grace’s.  I always trail them up these steps, for some reason, watching their bodies skipping towards the door.  Lately I’ve had the physicality of motherhood (and childhood) on my mind, and it is never more apparent than those moments when I watch their ever-lengthening bodies walking away from me.

We’ve been listening to Love Came Down at Christmas in the car, which Whit loves because it’s “the song he was the drum for.”  Last week, one morning, we had a very detailed conversation about my pregnancies with each of them.  Whit knows he kicked every time that carol came on and Grace, with her razor-sharp focus on fairness, wanted to know what song made her kick.  I don’t know, I told her honestly.  I went on to tell her about a day I’ll never forget, at my friend Schuyler’s wedding, in the summer of 2002, when I hadn’t felt Grace (then known as Finbar, gender unknown) for a while and sat on a couch prodding my stomach, my entire world narrowing for the first time to a beam of frantic concern about my child.  Okay, she said, satisfied that there was also a story about her inside my belly.

I watch them walk away and I think about all those days when I felt their little feet in my ribcage, when I watched an arm, a knee, an elbow, turn over inside me, a knobby piece of a yet-unknown person bulging against my domed skin as it did so.  Just as everyone cautioned, it’s hard to remember exactly what that felt, having a new life swimming inside of me.  While I know it was both miraculous and uncomfortable, I wish I remembered more precise details.

The intense physical union of pregnancy gives way, in a moment as brilliant and searing as lightning, to a time of continued bodily intertwined-ness.  I miss those days, too, in an odd, grateful, relieved kind of way.  And then, as the years of childhood unfurl, gradual but indeniable physical separation occurs.  I know there will be a day when my children don’t want me to curl up in bed with them.  A day when they will close the doors of their rooms and retreat to a world where I am not welcome.  A day when Whit’s first request, upon stubbing a toe, is no longer “will you kiss it, Mummy?”

I fear and dread that day, but I ought not let that keep me from imagining what is right now.  Isn’t this one of the central themes of my life?  The way I sometimes let fear of what is coming occlude the brightness of the moment?  Instead of falling into this familiar groove, allowing myself to be engulfed by an anticipated loss, may I instead lean into what is true right now.  Last night I tucked Grace in and discovered that she was clutching a tank top of mine; I hadn’t put her to bed, and in my absence she had gone into my closet and pulled out a piece of my clothing to hold close.  Whit still lets me wash his hair and soap his back in the bathtub, and each time I admit I wonder if this is the last time.  How long will the simple fact of my physical presence be enough to soothe whatever it is that upsets my children?

I want to stop that wondering and abandon myself to what is.  It’s so hard for me to do this.  But as I watch Grace’s feet grow and grow, edging into territory where our flip-flops could be confused for each other’s, and as Whit’s teeth fall out, I feel a vague panic about the future encroaching on the present.  I suspect part of this is my own deep longing for a day when concerns and anxieties could be so easily solved, in the body of a parent, in a kiss, in a sweet-dreams-head-rub.  The solution to this panic, I know, is the most counter-intuitive thing for me: I ought to turn away from it and curl into right now.  All I can do is try.

Ordinary thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was full of experiences that carried the mantle of important, moments I could feel turning to memories even as I lived them.  Most of all there was our Friday evening celebration of my in-laws’ 45th wedding anniversary and the 9th anniversary of my father-in-law’s successful heart transplant.  My in-laws had their three sons and five of their six grandchildren together (the sixth, 8 months old, was not able to stay up so late!) for a lovely dinner.  My sister-in-law and I made a book of photographs of the last 9 years for our father-in-law, and the memories contained in its pages brought everyone in the room to tears.  Also of note: my turkey was damn good.  I think my cider-based brine (which I pretty much made up) was a hit.  I think I was proudest, though, that all of my dishes were done before dinner was served.  A big achievement for such an ardent believer in clean as you go as I.

It was two far less weighty moments, however, that stand out for me as the most crystalline.  They were moments with a surprising, surreptitious power, the kinds of mundane experiences that I have learned can turn into the most sustaining and vital memories.  I hope that Grace and Whit remember days like these with the same affection and gratitude that I do.

On Friday morning Matt had to work so Grace, Whit and I took our skates to be sharpened and then stopped by a playground on the way home.  I sat on one of the swings (swinging alone is one of my favorite things to do) while they played together for 15 minutes … 30 … 45.  I swear.  I watched in wonder as they cooperated, laughed, and made up an imaginary world where the ground was lava.

The sky was crystal clear, the branches were all bare, and we didn’t see another human being the whole time we were there.  It was so warm both kids shed their jackets.

The sun shone on that hour.  And in its light I saw something glinting.  My life.

On Saturday afternoon Grace, Whit and I walked to a nearby movie theater to see The Muppets.   They are generally amenable to my walk-whenever-we-can policy, parroting now my points that it is better for both our health and for the environment.  On our way home we detoured past the house Hilary and I were born in.  I pointed out the windows to the living room, where I told Grace I remember walking in circles around the room reciting my times tables.  When I was in third grade.  With the homeroom teacher who is now her Math teacher.  And they are learning their times tables.  Sometimes it all swirls together so blindingly I have to blink and hold onto something so I don’t get dizzy.

The three of us played for a long time on the seesaw, which has three weighted balls that you can slide from side to side to even out the weight.  I wished my physicist father was with us to answer some of the questions I got.

Then they hopped on the swings and went for a while, holding hands.  They made up songs and sang them at the top of their lungs.  I sat over to the side, watching them.  The light turned their faces golden as it sank towards the horizon, and then everything cooled and dimmed when it slipped below it.  I looked at my children, and I looked at the light of the hour.

I am as proud of my children for their imaginative play as I am for any of their more conventional accomplishments.  I feel intensely grateful that they are still overjoyed by a playground, that they can run and jump and swing and invent a world.  That they want to do this together adds immeasurably to my joy.  This pride is linked to my belief about the power of fairy tales, I’m sure of it.  I want my children always to experience wildness (a central reason I love the cemetery so much, another place we went this weekend).  I want them to rejoice in the freedom offered by unstructured situations.  I want them to enjoy moving their bodies, to prize the fresh air, and to laugh together.

And they did.  And I was grateful.  The holiday held a plethora of gorgeous moments, for sure, many of which I’ll never forget.   The two that I felt were the purest expression of thanksgiving, though, were these two hours at the playground.

Still

This bird, which I think is a sparrow, has lately taken refuge in the corner of our front porch’s roof every few days.  The first time I saw him I had to look again, closely, wondering if he was alive.  I stood in the open door, watching for long minutes before I grew quiet enough to  finally see his little chest expanding and contracting. Yes.  He is alive.  The second time I saw him I thought: oh, wow, what a coincidence.

Now he’s familiar, no longer a shock, no longer a coincidence.  The first time I pointed him out to Grace and Whit they reacted in a way that surprised me: instinctively, their voices fell, their demeanor softened.  When he comes, they each choose to stand in the front door gazing up at him for much longer than I would have expected.  They are riveted, charmed, enchanted.  For some reason they treat him, and the space around him, with a kind of respect and reverence that is rare in the rest of their lives.  Now it is they who point him out to me, and his little corner is the first place they look every time they pass the door.

“Can I name him?” Grace asked me recently.  Of course, I answered.

“I’m going to think about it,” she said.  A couple of days later, she was sitting at breakfast eating her Cheerios in silence.  She chewed and looked quietly out the window.  I cleaned out the coffee maker.  Out of nowhere, she said, “Still.”

I turned to her.  “What, Grace?”

“Still.  That’s the bird’s name.”  I nodded at her.  Tears sprang to my eyes.  “Because he’s so still.”

And, I thought, because he’s still here.  He is still, motionless, quiet, calm.  And he is devoted, dedicated; he comes back.  And now, every time I see him, I can feel something solid and velvety burrow in my chest, can feel my exhales deepen.  And I think:

Still.

Firsts and lasts

Whit lost his third tooth this weekend.  As usual, I cried as I hugged him, celebrated one of life’s passages even as I mourned it.  Is there a more tangible marker of growing up than teeth falling out?  I don’t think so.

Later that day, Grace and I were driving home from her soccer game and talking about Whit’s tooth.

“Does it make you sad, Mummy?”

“Well, yes, sort of, Grace.  I mean, you know that.”

“But it doesn’t make you sad when I lose my teeth, right?”

I glanced back at her in the backseat, tousled from her season-ending soccer game, cheeks pink.

“Well, Grace, not really.  It’s always the first time when something like that happens for you.  And so it’s exciting.”

“And you know that Whit still has those things ahead, right?  He’s your baby.”  She was looking out the window.

“Well, yes.”  Was she upset?  I couldn’t tell.  We drove in silence for a few moments.

“I get to have all the firsts.  And Whit gets to have all the lasts.”

Of course, predictably, my eyes swam with tears behind my sunglasses.  I nodded and swallowed.  She’s right.  And how immensely fortunate I am that my life contains so many of both.

Nine

Dear Grace,

Today you are nine.  I realize I’m an enormous, pathetic cliche, but: how?  How did this happen?  The day you were born – in a downpour more torrential than any I’ve seen since – was moments ago.  And yet somehow in those minutes we have crammed nine years of living.  In the last few months I’ve seen you begin to cross over an invisible threshold.  You have grown taller and simultaneously more self-assured and insecure.  I can see your teenager-hood glinting on the horizon, for the first time, and I sense in you both the desire to bolt towards that faint light and the lingering wish that you could curl up in my lap forever.

One of my greatest joys as a mother is that you love reading as much as I do.  My very favorite afternoons are the ones that we both climb into my bed and read, side by side.  You’re devouring some of the books I remember most fondly from my childhood, lately: A Wrinkle in Time, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler, Tuck Everlasting, Little Women.  You also love to write; you write in a journal, you write letters, and you write stories.  Your first story was called Flying Sam, and it made nice use of magical realism.  You love school in general, and despite how much you like reading and writing, you tell me that your favorite subjects are Math and Computers.   That your Math teacher was my third grade homeroom teacher (the grade you’re now in) is just one example of the many ways the past and the present collide, throwing off glittering sparks that sometimes blur my vision.

You are playing on our town’s travel soccer team this fall, and I’m so proud of how you have embraced your team.  Historically you’ve been reluctant to participate in organized competitive sports (your lack of competitiveness here is something your father blames me for) but once you started with this team you really fell in love.  The girls on your team are from all over our town, from different schools, cultural backgrounds, and families, and you’ve found a place you feel very comfortable.  I how happy you are to be a part of a team and of a group who is more diverse than your school.  It’s also clear that you are listening to your coach and actively trying to improve your skills, an effort that makes me very proud.

There’s a core of sensitivity running through you that is surely your direct inheritance from me.  I am sorry about that, Gracie, and genuinely wish I could ease that burden.  I know I can’t, though, so instead I vow that I’ll keep reminding you of all the light, of all the joy, of all the ways that things that wound you are often not intended that way.  I’ll also sit with you when you feel “just sad,” make sure you know that the happiness will return, and tell you it’s okay to feel whatever you feel.  That’s all I can do.  I wish there was more.

You’ve begun to oscillate wildly between wanting me to leave you at the corner so you can walk alone, rolling your eyes and telling me I embarrass you, and still wanting me to carry you to bed sometimes.  I anticipate that this oscillation will grow in both amplitude and frequency in the next few years.  I try to be grateful that you still want me to listen to every single little thing, that you still cry out for me to watch your every move; I know that these days are numbered.

I know, primarily from being a daughter myself but also from academic study, that this back-and-forth is in service of something both essential and painful: separation.  You will, over the next nine years (you are halfway to eighteen!  to college!  oh … unbelievable) draw away from me in fundamental ways, gathering yourself into a Self that is independent and self-determined.  I don’t have to enjoy this process to know how vitally important it is.  Dropping you off at sleep-away camp this summer was one important step in that direction.  You cried saying goodbye to us, but I knew you would enjoy yourself and you did.  And you came home wearing a light mantle of confidence that I am delighted to see rippling about your shoulders.  You can and you will, my Gracie girl.

Happy ninth birthday.  As is our tradition, I’ll pick you up at school and take you on a special mother-daughter outing to a bookstore.  We will cross the street holding hands, you will pick out a pile of books, and we will have hot chocolate together.  Then we’ll have dinner at home and a black-and-white cake that I made for you from scratch (one of my favorite of your many quirks is that you dislike, and disdain, “store bought” cake, preferring those humbler treats made in my kitchen).  You’ll blow out candles and open a few presents – my commitment to anti-materialism continues, much to your chagrin.  Then we’ll go to bed like a regular night, with prayers and backrubs and hugs, and when I close the door you will have lived the first day of your tenth year.

I could never have dreamed what lay ahead of us, Grace, on that day nine years ago when I pulled you up onto my stomach myself after a long, brutal labor.  The pouring rain seemed to foretell, in retrospect, the ocean of tears that you and I would both cry in those first few months.  But as we all know, after rain like that you get rainbows.  And we have.  So, so many.  Thank you for reminding me to look at them.

I love you, Grace, my grace.