oh this is hard

These are days

Yesterday Grace, Whit and I went back to Storyland. Our first visit was nothing short of magical and I wanted to experience that again. I am determined to jam this summer that I’m not working full of memories for the children. I’m anxious about what reality will look like once I go back to work, and I realize this may be a once-in-a-lifetime chance. To that end, I just made plans to take them both to Legoland (yes, in San Diego, ie almost as far as you can get from Boston within the continental US) for three days in early August. I don’t know if I’m insane. After Whit melted down at Chili’s tonight I was convinced I was. But once I caught a glimpse of his angelic sleeping face in the rearview mirror, I decided again that it was a good idea. Stay tuned.

They had another marvelous day at Storyland. We left an hour earlier than planned because it started pouring. As I pulled out of the parking lot I felt a pang of real sadness, surprised by how unhappy I was that this much-anticipated visit was over. I don’t know when we will be back, if I’ll be able to just take them here on the spur of the moment next summer, or even what next week holds.

As we sat in traffic in North Conway, the kids descended into their annoying and predictable bickering. Whit snapped at Grace, “I don’t like you, Grace. Not at all.” She surprised me by saying to him, calmly, “Whit, I know you don’t mean that. I know you care a lot about me.” Conversation closed. She turned and looked out of her window, ignoring him for a while.

After a dinner pitstop at Chili’s we drove the last hour to Boston. Whit fell asleep clutching the threadbare and treasured animal that he’s taken to calling his Beloved Monkey, a name that for some reason charms me. Grace was tired but not asleep, gazing out into the evening. It was simply a beautiful night, everything soft around the edges, the world draped in the faint pink haze of sunset. “Grace?” I spoke into the quiet stillness that had settled over the car. She nodded, caught my eye in the mirror. “I thought what you said earlier about knowing Whit loves you even when he said otherwise was really smart. Try to remember that in life. People say a lot of things they don’t mean.”

“Yes. I think sometimes people say things because they are tired, and cranky, and angry.” She lapsed into silence again and my breath caught in my throat at my daughter’s wisdom. May she hold onto this particular piece of it; I know I for one could use the reminder on an almost daily basis.

The song “These Are Days” came on the radio and about halfway through I realized I was singing along under my breath.

These are days you’ll remember …
Never before or never since, I promise,
will the whole world be warm as this.

I was startled to feel tears rolling down my face. These familiar roads, this beautiful city that I love, on the horizon, wreathed in pale pink fog, these sleepy children, these days passing faster than I can bear. Yet again of the loss that limns every single minute of my life lurched up into the foreground. My heart is so full of aches and fears right now, of feelings so big they threaten to overwhelm me. No matter how determined or desperate I am to make this summer full of warmth for Grace and Whit, of memories and joy, it will end. There is nothing I can do to change that. The keening anguish of this fact is sometimes truly more than I can bear.

I noticed that the license plate on the car in front of me was BEACON. Yes. This is my beacon, there is no question: remembering that this is all I have brings me back, over and over again, to right now. I drove through the beautiful dusk, feeling again the haunting awareness of how fleeting it all is, acknowledging reluctantly the unavoidable truth that my grasping at moments just makes them run through my fingers more quickly. Following my beacon, my eyes dazzled by the deep summer blue sky smudged with faint pink and gray clouds, and light glowing from below the horizon, I drove my children home.

Summer fever

A couple of weeks ago, Whit had a high fever all weekend.  He was listless and not himself, he threw up a couple of times, and his fever just would not come down.  Plus for three days in a row he took 2+ hour naps in the afternoon.  As delightful as his sleeping and his unusual desire for extra cuddling was, I knew something was wrong.

On Monday we went to see our beloved Dr. Rick.  Dr. Rick who is leaving practice in the fall.  Sob.  Another farewell, another changes, another factor contributing to the earthquake.  I am very, very tired of goodbyes, endings, and changes.  Have I mentioned that?

Anyway.  Whit and I sat in the waiting room.  Well, I sat.  Whit lay down (see above).  He was quiet and subdued and altogether not himself.

“Whit, do you want me to read to you?”  (I was sitting in a third chair, by his feet)

“No.”

“Are you sure”

“Yes.”  He sighed heavily and lay there, staring into space.  I reached over with my right hand and rubbed his skinny little calves, marveling at how simultaneously tiny-thin they are and how grown-up-long.  With my left hand I read my email on my iPhone.

A few minutes later I felt him sitting up.  He curled up in the chair next to me, his legs drawn up under him, and leaned his head over onto my shoulder.  I put down my phone and turned to kiss his forehead.  Against my lips his skin felt hot.

“Whitty, are you okay, baby?”  He took in breath audibly and I pulled my face back so I could study him.  I could tell he had something on his mind.  “Whit?”

“Mummy,” he began, tentatively.  “What if the doctor can’t find anything wrong with me?”  He wouldn’t look at me, staring resolutely at the edge of the receptionist’s desk across the room.

“Why does that worry you, Whitty?”

“Well because if he finds something wrong then I’ll get better faster, right?”

“Well, maybe.”

“And if he doesn’t find something wrong maybe this is just how I will feel from now on?”

My eyes filled with tears.  Isn’t this the thing we all fear?  If we can’t name, and treat, or fix, or medicate the thing that is making us feel bad, then is it simply who we are?  I remember when the children were small being very relieved at an ear infection diagnosis, for two reasons – the first being that the antibiotics would quickly kick in, improving the screaming and up-all-night situation, and the second being that if there wasn’t an ear infection then didn’t that just mean that this cranky, yelling, ornery behavior was simply my baby’s personality?

I pulled Whit against me, cupping his bony, bird-like shoulder in my hand, squeezing him, feeling the fever radiate from his forehead and the exhaustion in his sagging body.  Of course a summer fever is not an internal demon.  Of course not.  But it did remind me of the deep human fear of that which we cannot fully understand or subdue inside us, and of the various ways this makes us act out, seek comfort, dull ourselves.  I was reminded of Where the Wild Things Are, of all the ways that we cope with the fearful demons we sometimes feel raging inside of us, and of the Jung quote that “the most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.”


These are things that speak to me now

I am heavy and full right now, waterlogged with feeling, tired and a bit burned from exposure to the sun, both literal and figurative. The changes of the last month or two are settling in, making themselves at home, and the rhythm of this new reality (albeit an interlude for just this summer, which creates its own anxiety) is becoming familiar. I feel a bit out of words, but also as though there is a tide of them brimming up inside of me, the vague pressure slowly mounting. I hope I can ride this tide to somewhere that has meaning, and peace, and calm. I’ll let you know.

In the meantime, I seek refuge, as is my habit, in the words of others. Today, Meg Casey’s essay, These are things I know now, spoke to me. I’ve quoted Meg before, and I think she’s one of the most exquisitely honest writers out there. Her journey resonates with me and I’m touched every single time I read her words. Maybe what I’m feeling right now is surrender to my empty bowl, to the trust that something essential and life-giving will fill it.

Meg, thank you, as always, for providing solace when I feel the undertow most strongly, for when I feel storm-tossed and run aground at the same time.

These are things I know now – Meg Casey

That sometimes the most beautiful innocence can be born from deep suffering, desperation and ugliness
That nothing is ever one thing and even the most exquisite joy and breathtaking beauty can be punctuated by sadness and loss and even the most heartbreaking grief can be tinged with a rosy kindness
That laughter and silliness and ridiculousness is sometimes the only answer to heaviness
That my heart will whisper to me exactly what I must do next
That angels most certainly must exist
That I have sisters who I will walk with and they will not leave me and I will not leave them because our paths are intertwined whether we like it or not (though we mostly like it)
That love (not sappy silly love by lionness roaring love) is alchemical — it is the magic ingredient and while it sounds so trite its true
That the youngest among us are extremely powerful and hold all the wisdom that we forgot
That miracles are like tsunamis and leave disasterous messiness in their wake and it is a saint’s job to clean up what comes behind, physically hold the wounded together to sutcher their souls.
Saints also bring lemon cake and stand on chairs tip toe to hang paper hearts from the ceiling

I can’t look at everything hard enough

Emily (softly, more in wonder than in grief):

I can’t bear it. They’re so young and beautiful. Why did they ever have to get old? Mama, I’m here. I’m grown up. I love you all, everything. – I can’t look at everything hard enough.

….

Emily (in a loud voice to the Stage Manager):

I can’t. I can’t go on. It goes so fast. We don’t even have time to look at one another.

She breaks down sobbing.

I didn’t realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed. Take me back – up the hill – to my grave. But first: Wait! One more look.

Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover’s Corners … Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking … and Mama’s sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths … and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you.

She looks toward the stage manager and asks abruptly, through her tears:

Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? – every, every minute?

Stage manager:

No.

– from Our Town, Thornton Wilder

Thank you to Martha for urging me to re-read this extraordinary play … I can’t wait to talk about it. And to Katrina, for your glorious essay whose timing cannot be a coincidence.

A reflection of what it is in this life you prize most highly

I have been thinking nonstop about Anne Lamott’s piece, about our true wealth being this moment, this hour, this day. As usual, she is basically the oracle to me, among my wisest and most impactful teachers. I agree with her initial assertion “that there is nothing you can buy, achieve, own, or rent that can fill up that hunger inside for a sense of fulfillment and wonder.” She herself says that this is not revolutionary, but in fact the basis for “almost all wisdom traditions.” She talks about “chances of lasting connection or amazement” and I think of Mary Oliver’s glorious line that often scrolls through my thoughts:

When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement

Let us all be less cynical, less negative, less judgmental.  Let us all have more wonder, more trust, more giving each other space to be human.  Let us all remember that almost everyone is really just doing the best they can.

What Anne’s essay has me thinking about today, though, is about the way we make time for that which we really value.  In fact, I think that if we each looked back over how we have spent the last day or week, we would see, in neon animation, a graph of what it is we really honor and think is important.  That’s what we make time for.  Most often, this happens instinctively, without much forethought or analysis.  It simply is.  We just say yes to that which we care most about.  Other times, we have to actively, even fiercely guard the time for certain activities or people who are near to our hearts.

Let’s no longer hide behind the excuse that we “don’t have time.”  The truer response would be “I don’t care enough to really protect the time.”  Maybe this is harsh, but I think it’s also true.  Think long and hard about how you spend your precious hours, the only currency in this life that I personally think is actually worth anything.  And if you look carefully at these choices, you will see a reflection of what it is in this life you prize most highly.  Do you like what you see?