Whitman

Proof that Whit is my son

I have often joked that parenting is primarily the painful experience of watching your own worst traits animate in another person.  That’s certainly something I do often with my children.  Grace’s similiarities to me are immediately evident, but Whit’s are more buried.  His little boy bravado and bluster hide a core of deep sensitivity.  He can be sentimental and nostalgic, and is prone to emotional outbursts about things being over.  There were several moments this summer when I was reminded with breathtaking clarity how much my son’s emotional terrain resembles my own, though we are wrapped in such different packaging (and how different those packages are.  notably, his is adorable, and hilarious.  mine, not so much.).

Three experiences in particular did this.

Arguably the scariest ride at Legoland is called “Knights Tournament,” and two riders are strapped into seats which are then thrown around, upside down, all around.  There are 5 levels, and Grace and Whit are only tall enough to do 1 or 2.  Last summer we tried 1.  This summer we went for 2.  The first time we went on it was at dusk on our first evening in the park (we have a routine of going back after an afternoon swimming break and early dinner).  Whit disembarked and, taking my hand, announced, “Well, that was fun.  The best part about it was that you got such a good look at the sky.”

Our second night home Whit was absolutely inconsolable at bedtime.  He could not sleep.  He was tearful and clingy.  He told me he missed Legoland desperately, and was incredibly sad that something he’d so anticipated had come and gone.  It’s just going too fast, Mummy, he said, murmuring into my neck as we lay on his bottom bunk in the dark.  It’s hard to console someone when you yourself are overwhelmed with the precise emotions they are trying to deal with.

On the first Friday of school, I picked Grace and Whit up and took them to our local library to return some books and collect some others that I had ordered.  I let them each choose a movie also.  Two of the books in the stack the librarian handed to me were for Whit: Origami Yoda and The Way Things Work.  As we walked out to the car I had a stack of books and the two movies on my arms.  Whit held the door for me and then, trotting next to me to the car, announced, “Oh, Mummy, I love the library.  Look at all this great stuff we got there!”

I am constantly amazed and often flummoxed by the ways that genetics work.  Both of my children contain aspects of Matt, parts of me, and some mysterious element all their own; and through the particular alchemy of personhood they are each their own, unique, maddening, extraordinary person.

I hope you dance

Yesterday morning, Grace and I drove Whit to camp.  This week is lacrosse camp for him, and she is home because she heads to sleepaway camp on Thursday morning.  En route, “I Hope You Dance” by Lee Ann Womack came on the radio.  I turned it up.  “Listen to this, guys!  No, really.  Listen.  This is the best summary I know of what I want for you both, as your mother.”

I glanced back in the rear view and saw that they were both listening.  Each was turned, looking out of the window on their side of the car.  Give the heavens above more than just a passing glance, sang Lee Ann.

“Well, we do that, Mummy.”  Grace chimed in.

“We do?” I smiled.

“Yeah, we look at the sky all the time!”  Whit added.  We fell silent again, listening.

I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean came out of the radio.  “I know what that feels like!” Whit laughed.  “When I swim out to the raft, or when we jump off the boat into the ocean, I feel tiny!  Sometimes it’s sort of scary!”  Grace nodded with a faint smile on her face.

When the song came to an end, I turned the radio off.  “What do you guys think that means, I hope you dance?”

“I think maybe it means doing big things, having experiences.  Right?” Grace said.

“Also, taking risks?” Whit offered.

“Yes.  I think it means living life, you know?  Jumping in.”

“Like we do off the boat, or we did at Walden that day?” Whit asked.  I remembered the two of them hurtling headlong into the clear, still water of Walden Pond early in the morning, remembered the peals of their laughter in the morning stillness.

“Yes.  Exactly.”  I blinked back tears.  “And you know, the other line I really, really love in that song is I hope you never lose your sense of wonder.”  The brake lights in front of me blurred.  I peered in the rear view mirror again.  They were both staring out their windows.  I started to say something and then I stopped myself.  I focused on the lights in front of me and I drove.  Grace and Whit were quiet in the back.

After a couple of minutes of silence, I finally said, “I really do hope that, you know.  Probably most of all.  Never lose your sense of wonder.  There’s magic everywhere, and I hope you can always see it.”

Early morning at Walden

Last week Grace and Whit weren’t in any camps, because of the 4th of July and our plan to spend the second half of the week with my sister and family (just back from Jerusalem) at my parents’ house on the ocean.  So we had a couple of unscheduled days to play with.  One morning we went, early, to Walden Pond.  That raw March morning when the three of us walked around the pond was almost a year and a half ago.  It is a day that they both still refer to.  It’s funny how that decision, made on a whim, to seek out the quiet of Walden and to trust that my children would respond to its calm yielded one of our most enduring recollections.  A reminder that for me at least it is hard to predict which moments will crystallize into cherished memories, turned over in our minds like touchstones in our pockets, worn smooth with caressing.

We woke to a clear blue early July morning and headed immediately west, hoping to beat the crowds that I know swarm Walden Pond on warm days.  Arriving just before 8, we were almost alone.  The children immediately walked into the water, marveling at how clear it was, and how warm.  All three of us ducked under the first line and swam out, noticing that the water quickly grew darker, debating why this was.  It got deep quickly, Grace noticed.  And it did.  After a bit of a swim we turned around and returned to where they could stand.

Then they played in the shallows chasing schools of almost translucent yellow fish.  Their laughter rang in the quiet air.  I hung back and watched them, hearing Thoreau in my head.  I almost called the children over to quote the famous lines, to make sure they understood the importance of the place we stood.  And then I caught myself.  I didn’t need to point it out to them.  They knew.  They know.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

 

The story I can’t stop telling

I have a new piece on the Huffington Post, The Story I Can’t Stop Telling.  It’s a story which will be very familiar to anyone who’s read anything I write here.

And I really can’t stop telling it.  While swimming this afternoon, Whit hopped in one end of the pool while I happened to be walking by.  I watched him set out to swim the whole length, which he did, inelegantly but without stopping.  I hadn’t told him I was watching, so I didn’t think he knew.  But when he got to the other end, he hauled himself up by his still-narrow shoulders, water sluicing off his white back.  I smiled at the back of his head and then was startled when he turned to look at – or maybe for – me.  I gave him a thumbs up and a big smile and his grin in return was incandescent.  He still wants to know I’m watching him.

I know these days are numbered, and the drumbeat sound of their passage deafens me.  The sweetness overwhelms me and makes me cry.  And all I know how to do is to pay close attention, to watch and listen and love deeply, and then to write it all down.

To write down the story I can’t stop telling.