Graduation Day

"Oh, Big A.

What you did to my heart, that moment first I saw you.

I could feel the heart within me rip and twist in ways I'd never known, in just that first second that I peered upon you.

There was a light, so bright, so clear and so true in that moment; it was piercing in its clarity, blinding in its rapture. Everything I had learned up to that moment, unlearned. Everything I thought that I had held dear, lying neglected upon the floor of my life as I worshiped at your altar.

I couldn't sleep, because I had to keep gazing upon you, making promises to you. I remember them, my little girl, and I will keep them. I just hadn't intended on them being so long in the making.

That night, so long and snowy ago. That night, only yesterday, wasn't it, sweet child? Wasn't it then, my little thing, that you first laid within the confines of my arms? Wasn't it only a minute ago that I first caressed your cheeks?

No.

It wasn't.

I blinked, and then Ten."

The Things I Cannot Talk About, Part One

I.

Thing One stands about 5'9 and looms large on my horizon.

It has long legs, strong arms, a beautiful mind.

And It has wings.

Big wings. 

II.

Over the course of the last year, I've often found myself thinking about my sister and Her Thing.  

I think about how hard it was to see Him fly away.

I recall vividly her front porch and how she and I, illuminated by the moonlight, sat talking very late into the night one warm summer evening. 

So very late, in fact, that before we thought to be aware, the night had suddenly disappeared and transformed into The Morning That She Had To Release Him.

From those memories an ache deep within me rises so quickly and so violently that I cannot bear to reflect on the morning that is advancing so rapidly toward me: The Morning When I Have To Release My Thing.

_________________________________________________________________

III.

Sometimes I can hear The Thing. 

There are moments when the sound of her wings fluttering against the sides of her cage become so emphatic, so loud, that I close my eyes tightly as I did when I was a child and I tell myself, "It's all okay, it's all okay. There's nothing there. Put those thoughts away. Push them back down. It's not real. It's not real. It's okay."

I can make myself believe that indeed, it's all in my head. 

It's all in my head. 

I'll inhale a deep breath and slowly open my eyes.

And then I hear the flutter of her wings again and I know The Thing is real. 

And I know The Thing is stirring. 

And It isn't in my head. 

Far, far worse: It is within my heart.

A Letter To My Grandfather In October

I remembered how at your funeral there was a place in your casket where notes could be placed; how we were encouraged to write something down; how I was instantly suspicious and how my mom had said, "Jennifer, come on."

--

Before I Was Me

The Queens and I had the gift of today together and while we were running around playing, suddenly the sight of them laughing caught me off guard and sent me careening backwards, into yesteryear, my own sister by my side, a fall day shining down on us.

There was nothing particularly memorable about the day, nothing specific regarding the memory, but just for a moment, I could almost feel her beside me, her hand in mine, the way that she'd lean on me.

It struck me then, while I was lingering between what I thought would be and what is, that I've spent a lot of time thinking of what is to come, rather than focusing on what is now.

And What Will You Do?

 *This post has been edited; please see below for updates. 

I cannot express how sad I am to write this post.  I have written drafts with many paragraphs, linked to many sites, raged many rages, cried many tears, but we've all read enough words and seen enough news.

Ultimately, I don't believe that I can write what I want to say.  Instead, I am going to use minimal words and try to get my point across in photos.

I ask that you click on each one; study each face; memorize each detail, for those details are important.

Seven

Seven tomorrow; just as all the rest have come, Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, the Questionable One.

Seven.

The picture is from Six, of course, for who knows what Seven will bring, but I am assuming it will not bring Time to write this post, for it will be filled with friends, a pool, sisters and a ball park to watch Big A easily display the magic combination of youth and a softball glove.

Funny thing; Time, that in all my writing about it, it's still a mystery; a knot that the more I try to unravel the tighter it becomes; weaving within my chest a separate knot that leaves me forever caught between a smile and a tear.

I want her to grow; I want her to stay small. I want her to be aware. I want her to have no idea.

She's my enigma. How she can so simply know the deepest truths while still believing the most innocent of things?"Well do you believe in Santa, Peanut? Who do you think you would know better if there's a Santa? You or some silly kids on the bus? Of course there are fairies, Little A; how else would those letters with Pixie Dust make their way under your pillows? Let's look at the pictures of the Fairy Villages!"

Seven.

And Santa still lives here. The Tooth Fairy still lives here. Children grow faster, know more now. Will Little A's Seven become Big A's Eight? I don't remember who I was before I was their mother; who will I be when I am no longer the mother of children? Is that the knot ever-growing within my chest?

Six was magic. Six was the summer of Justin Verlander. Six was when the ability to memorize and recite stats began to come in handy rather than be a freakish anomaly.

Six was the first letter home from a teacher that read, "Jenn, I thought you would want to know that today Little A played with kids and wasn't alone at lunch." Six was reading entire chapter books under covers with flashlights carefully hidden so I wouldn't find them before she went to bed. Six was when she used her Magic to make the Tigers win multiple games in a row.

Six was hard. Six meant explaining why Magic can make the Tigers make it to the playoffs and not to the World Series. Six meant explaining cancer. Repeatedly. Why some cancers can be cured; why some cancers cannot. Why Magic cannot cure cancer. Six meant explaining that yes, mommies and daddies die sometimes. Why Santa cannot fix cancer. Six meant new medications and new therapies and new exhaustion when I didn't think there could be new ones.

I would keep Six, if I could. Which I cannot.

So tomorrow I am happy to greet Seven. I've heard that in Fairy lore Seven is the age when Fairy villages begin to appear to those that believe....

To Seven, Little A.

I love you more than love,
Mommy

Fifteen

Dear Big A, 

Fifteen. 

I have to pause and take a deep breath as I try to wrap my mind around this moment, this day. I remember when you turned five that I was thinking, "In five more years, she's going to be ten, five years after that, she's going to be fifteen" and on and on. 

At that point in time, the concept seemed impossible. It still does, except this morning you blew out fifteen candles on your birthday pancake and there I was, drifting between five and fifteen and stunned, still, with the realization that I have no idea where the time has gone. 

I know I tell you so many times that I think that you are amazing. I know that hearing it from your mom isn't the blanket of comfort to you that I mean for it to be. I'm aware that me loving you doesn't solve anything for you; that it isn't the salve that can heal the wounds that come with being a teen; that it doesn't make things easier. I know that my kisses don't make things better anymore and that your belief in my magic is gone. My saving hope is that your belief in your own magic remains.

Could you bear it, one more time, me telling you of how much I loved you the moment that I saw you? I know that you cannot, but I think that I cannot tell you it enough. You sliced my world apart; cut me to the core and filled it with such a light that I was momentarily blinded. I still feel that each time I look at you. "How can something so wonderful be mine?" And then I remember that you're not mine, that you are yours and then I hope that someday you will feel something so powerful that it moves you to beyond anything that words can describe and you will think, "That is how much she loved me."

So many times within the past year I have seen you from afar and not recognized you. I knew who you were, of course, but to see you, really see you, that slayed me each time. You are so beautiful, so composed, so gifted that I have to remind myself of the moment that I met you, that you were a part of my being, because I cannot imagine having created and nurtured someone so wonderful. 

I'm sorry for all of the times that you felt that I didn't think you were anything but my world. I'm sorry if you ever thought that I pushed you too much, that I wasn't happy with something that you did--it's just that I want you to see how the world is in your hands and all of the potential that you hold--it's much different than where I am at now in my life; my world being in the hands of you and your sister. 

Today I couldn't stop myself from thinking that in five more years, you will be twenty. You will be gone from our home, out making your way in the universe. I know that you will come back, but that it will never be the same, nothing is ever the same anyway, so that doesn't bother me so much anymore. What makes me ache is how much I miss the little you, your precious cheeks and legs and how you would lay on my chest and sleep all night.  

I don't think of time as passing and the moments being gone so much as I think of it as the moments remaining there forever, each second living on within its own universe. That thought soothes me some, thinking that those precious minutes exist still and that I can visit them, feel them, smell them whenever I wish. The trick is not staying there reminiscing too long, for I want to make sure that I participate in today and tomorrow and each gift of time with you that I have. 

I love that we can speak fluent sarcasm with each other and know that it's a language of love. I love that you can sing the words of my favorite songs. I loved that last night when we were singing in the car and you said something about being embarrassing and got out to run into the gym and I rolled down the window so that Little A and I could belt out, "Born and raised in south Detroit", I could see your face in the glass door and that you were laughing. Your beautiful face grinning from ear to ear made even the saddest corners of my soul smile. 

Fifteen, Big A. You are my sunshine; you always have been from the moment I laid my eyes upon you.

Happy, happy birthday my love.

Love always, 
Your Adoring Mother

The Edge

"You figured what?  You'd just get out of there and bounce right back?"  

I shrugged, wiped away my tears that seem to always be threatening to fall and said that I just thought I would feel better.

"You probably feel better than being dead. It's been a little over a month. A month. Think of that."

"I think of it too much, I think."  

A Letter To The A's Following 40

Dear A's,

I always write a birthday letter to you on your birthdays, but I figured for this milestone that has just passed that I would write a letter to you following my birthday.

40 is different; an age that I'm sure feels a million miles away from your beautiful faces; I hope it always does. There are things I want to tell you, sitting here at 40, realizing how time does really does pass and immortality begins to wash away as the moments that add up to a lifetime march across the decades.

First, you are my entire world. It's crazy that I know that an entire galaxy exists around me, yet you hold it all within your hands. I hope that you never love anyone this much, but I hope that you are always this loved. I know that if you have children, you will understand what I mean when I say this--unless you do, don't try to dissect what I've said--the words will never make sense to you. 

I want you to know that it's OK to take chances. And fail. And get back up and try again. Ignore what everyone else says and listen to what you hear within you; follow that course with all that you have, no matter where it takes you. Just always get back up again. It's with the falling that we learn to rise.

I beg of you your patience with me as you grow. My direction is, sadly, but truly, what most well-meaning parents direction is made of--the realization of how truly each moment matters; how the smallest of actions can do or undo almost anything--an entire life can hinge on the tiniest of circumstances. I would urge you to do it, whatever it is that you fear, whether that means jumping from an airplane or reaching out for a hand in front of you, speaking in a moment that won't ever come again or simply allowing yourself to be loved.

Whatever it is you choose to do, do it with wild abandon. Be the scrappiest player on the court, be able to hold intellectual conversations and keep an open mind, but be able to hold your ground when you know from the deepest parts within that they are right. Laugh--loudly, cry when you need to and always understand that not everyone can do those things at the same time. Study the times when you feel the very happiest and know what it is that made you feel that way; don't let go of those things.

It's not easy to sometimes hear the loudest of sounds around us; sometimes you have to listen from within. It's an acquired trait and I've seen it in both of you; please, wherever you go, whatever you do, do not forget that compassion and pass it onto your children should you choose to have them; it would be the greatest trait possible to pass on.

Hug more. Hate less. Your energy is your energy--only let you decide how you use it, but do know that you only have a certain amount and you can use it positively or negatively, I pray that you choose positively.  

Books! Don't forget books. I hope that you always let the magic pull you in. You cannot recall how religiously I read to you from infancy, but I know that you've both realized the magic and worlds that are within them. 

It's alright to be an introvert. It doesn't mean being anti-social, but it means that you are alright on your own--and that is the thing that I want you both to be, more than anything--good with being with just you.  Whether that means always having someplace or something for just you, or whether that means simply choosing to never anchor yourself to someone or something, I want you to know that it's OK. 

Baseball. I want you to remember baseball, but I want you to be able to watch it without crying when you recall all of the Detroit Tiger games that we attended. It's tricky; I haven't figured it out yet. I can tell you that one of the strongest dreams that I had while I was fighting in the hospital was me riding in a pick-up truck with my Grandpa, Ernie Harwell was on the radio.  

It's why I couldn't watch the Tigers the year after he was gone. It's why I cry still, three years after he's been gone, when the Tigers are on. It's why I keep reminding you when we go to the games to shut your eyes and listen; study the field; stop; to remember the moment. Because those are the moments that you will realize at 40 that were the best moments of your lives. You won't know that until time passes and you will wish that you slowed down to remember.
 
I wish for you every happiness, but enough sorrow to understand that there are those that know nothing but that. I wish for you enough challenges along the way to make you stronger; smarter; your very best and enough knowledge gained from those challenges to make you happy; so very happy that you never feel the weight of the world on your shoulders, but realize that there are those that feel only that and a heart wide enough and bright enough and big enough to help them.  

Realize that there is not enough good you can do in the world.

Take off your coat when you see someone without one on the street of a city that I hope you roam and give it to them. Open doors for everyone, with a smile. Pay the toll for the car behind you when you can. It will come back to you; I promise it will; sometimes when you least expect it and most need it. 

Realize that beauty lies within almost everything; sometimes you have to look for it, sometimes you just feel it. Make sure that you, too, sleep with your daughters, should you have them, under the stars on a warm summer night on a trampoline. Feel free to watch them as they sleep under the very galaxy that they hold within their hands.

Do not listen to those that tell you that you can hold your child too much, let them sleep with you too much or love them too much, for time passes quickly and before you know it they may stand taller than you and you will wonder where the time has gone, and no matter how much you held them, you will find yourself wishing that you'd held them more.

I love you both so very much.  

I love you more than love.

Your most willing servant, always,

Mom   

On Turning 40

  Today is the last day of my 30's.  I'm home today because Little A is sick with the flu.  It's sunny outside; I wish I could lace up my shoes and go for a run; I wish I could make my lungs ache the way they used to after running outside in the cold instead of the way that they ache now. 

  I didn't spend the last year in my thirties as planned.  When I added it up in my ever-thinking brain, I spent about three months in the hospital and almost all of it laid up because of my hip.  Four surgeries later and I finally have hope; sometimes that is what springs from the darkest of nights. 

  After my last surgery, the day after I came home, my temperature was 102.9.  The following day it was 103.2 with a racing heart and difficulty breathing.  When I said that I was hurting and couldn't breathe, I was met with disbelieving eyes, so I quit saying it.  The next day I had an ache in my back that I said pain was radiating from.  That was the same day that I had to promise the visiting nurses that I could get to the hospital faster than them calling 911.

  It wasn't the emergency room that was so bad; it was what followed about six hours later when nurses and a doctor ran into the room.  They told me I was being moved to a bed for more tests; when I got back, the doctor sat down on my bed and reached for my hand.  "You're very sick, you are septic."

  After initially joking that sepsis couldn't kill me (yes, I still joke at the darkest times; it's my coping mechanism of choice) I asked him if I was going to live.  I expected him to answer yes, but instead he said that I had a big battle ahead of me.  It was an odd sensation; like a whirling inside, spinning fast, yet slow; hearing voices, remembering moments, recalling regrets, all at once, with The A's wrapped around all of it.

  I had to call my parents.  I remember the conversation, asking my mom if my dad was home.  I tried to sound casual, but my mother wasn't buying it.  I told her that I was in the hospital and sick; that I was septic.  "Are you going to die?" she asked.  I can't imagine asking either of my daughters that question.  I don't remember how I answered her.  When I awoke, my friends were there.  I had IV's in both arms and the room was dark.  The fight began.   

  I asked for my computer; not out of boredom, but to type up letters to say goodbye.  I did this periodically, between waking and sleeping.  I worried about the A's.  I worried about my family. I worried about my friends.  I wonder now if I should just send the letters despite making it; that's the hardest part-the wondering. 

  I wanted to go home; I wanted to be with the girls, but at the same time, not let my family see me.  I wept each day as the infection grew and began to compress my internal organs. Each time they tried to draw blood, it was an extremely painful process; it took an eternity as my veins rolled around inside of me and IV's blew out of my arms.  I wept each time until they finally gave me a PICC line.  It entered in by my elbow and ran to near my heart.  When they pulled it out of me, I asked to keep it as a reminder of what I'd done, just in case I lose my nerve or hope again. 

  I had dreams; dreams of my grandfather, dreams full of light.  Dreams that I was swimming deep within the ocean.  

  I wasn't afraid to die; I just didn't want to.  Those are two very different things. 

 Each day my lungs filled with fluid.  Each day I thought of the irony-that all my life I'd worried about open water and drowning in it, but the reality was that I would drown myself in a hospital. I would say the lung tap was the worst pain that I endured there, but truly, it was a visit from Big A that was the most unbearable.  She had broken down and wept and wept and wept.  I wanted to take all of her pain and place it within me.  I know that this is not how it works. 

  I wonder now why I pushed her so hard to grow up.  She's a freshman excelling in advanced classes with a 4.0 GPA; next year, the odds are that she will actually attend college rather than high school.  I tell her each day how much I love her.  Each day I wish for more time.  Almost without fail, I cry on a daily basis from being so happy or seeing something so beautiful that it makes me ache and want to share it with her and Little A.  I want more time with her.  I will not get it.  

  The day I came home, it was easier to let go of the people that weren't really friends; it was easier to see appreciation in each sunrise, easier to breathe, figuratively, although each day the breathing does come easier.  

  Tomorrow when I turn 40, my grandmother turns 80.  I never would have imagined us spending birthdays apart, yet we will.  I've loved sharing our birthdays over the years, but I can see dreading them in the future.  So much of me was woven with her; by her, and  yet here we are, so many miles apart.  I wonder what it will be like if I get the opportunity to grow that old and not be with the people I love the most.  

  I thought I was going to dread tomorrow.  Rather I am grateful for it.  For a new chance; for a new day; for a new birth at 40.  Here is to 2013; to 40; to The A's; to life in general.  

Never Without Tears

    I called for her again today.  The A's laugh at me when I call them by the name of the other, or when I stand, dumbfounded, trying to simply recall their name as my ability to remember dashes in and out of shadows within my mind. 

    I'm not sure that they've heard me call for her; it always seems to be when I am alone, lost in some other thought, some other habit, some other time when the most natural of my impulses take over.

    It's been three years now, so one would believe that when I do call out her name the seconds that follow wouldn't bring such a rush of emotion; the waiting for her to come; the realization that she is gone, still, a punch to my gut, a knife in my heart, a tear falling to the floor that I wipe away with my foot. 

    It's hard to let go of such a soul that you love so much.  I remember laying in my bed for months prior to our goodbye, daring God that if he existed to prove himself by letting her go peacefully into the night rather than forcing me to make the decision.  I remember the way that the dawn of one of the darkest days of my being began to rise; I remember her laying beside me, as she had for sixteen years, I remember thinking, "I cannot do this."

    It was a beautiful fall day, which is probably why I tend to call for her more in the fall.  We spent it outdoors together, me tenderly lifting her so she could stand and sit, until finally I needed help to lift her for the last time.  

    Little A swears that she still comes to visit her in her dreams, although she was only a toddler when we said goodbye.  Big A refuses to speak of her, for she doesn't like to talk about the things that make her ache inside. 

    I still see her, sometimes when I'm dreaming, sometimes when I am awake.  I still cannot say her name or speak of her without crying.  I suppose that is what love does to you when you love completely and have to say goodbye; smashes you in ways that make you able to go on, but never in the same way. I wonder if perhaps it isn't Time at all, but rather the weight of those losses that make us feeble and ache as we grow older; unable to move under the burden of the goodbyes. 

    I believe Edna St. Vincent Millay described it best when she said, "Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night.  I miss you like hell."  

    Until we meet again, Jessie, my love. 

I Don't Even Care

"Seriously," she whispered back to me, her eyes wide and bright, filled with excitement, "I don't even care."

"Seriously," I whispered back, "I hope that you always feel this way."  We locked eyes and I wondered if she would remember that moment, the two of us, whispering, in a bathroom stall because she's big enough to not want to hold my hand anymore, but not to overcome the terror that is the automatically flushing toilet. 

-----

The morning was brutal when I found her painting her nails instead of brushing her teeth and my words spilled out like hot lava, burning a path of destruction even as I tried my hardest to temper my words.  

"You have to make better decisions," my voice clipping away at her on the way to school, "you have to learn how to manage time and know that when I say 'five minutes' you don't start to paint your nails.  Time management.  Basic function."

I adjusted my rear view mirror so that I couldn't see her face out of the corner like I usually can because this was life, damn it, and she needed to know.  If I didn't teach her, how would she ever learn? 

There's no crying in baseball. 

Her eyes were still red when she opened the car door to say goodbye to me.  "You just have to learn, Peanut.  I love you and I hope you have a good day."  She stared back at me, unsure of what to do next.  "Close the door and get into school."  

She looked back at me three times as she made her way to the door.

"Too bad; that's life," I kept saying over and over as my stomach churned. 

It was three hours before I called the school to tell them that she had an appointment and I'd be picking her up.

She could hardly contain herself when I told her that we were actually going to lunch and the movies.  

We talked like two old souls over lunch of her choice, serious conversations about behavior and consequences and understanding that I had made a big mistake when I yelled at her; if we were different people we could have been lovers reconciling; our hands briefly entwining over and over, a kiss to her forehead, tears in both of our eyes. 

She ran into the empty theatre and I tried my best to jog behind her as she rattled off her ticket selection while blurting out that she wanted the pink and blue cotton candy.  

She wanted to sit in the top row of the empty theatre, "Of course," I thought; reminding myself that once upon a time I had thought of her very existence as that flight of stairs. 

It was after the show, in the bathroom, when I discovered the cotton candy woven into her hair like magic, "Seriously," I whispered, "you have cotton candy in your hair."

------

A cement truck was in front of us on the drive home.  "Why does that thing keep moving around and around?"  

"It has to keep moving," I said, "otherwise the cement will get hard and you wouldn't be able to move it."

I adjusted my rear view mirror to watch her eyes.

"So if it quits moving then it can't move anymore unless there is a hurricane or a tornado or something like that that comes along and picks it up to make it move?"  

"Sort of like that," I said, watching the center cavity of the truck churn over and over and over again, wondering if I was awaiting a storm or if I were still churning, awaiting my destination. 

Time management.  

Basic function.  

Make the best of it.  

And Boom

     She laughs on the way in the car, as I grab her hand and we make a joke about something.  It was only a few hours ago, but I don't recall what the joke was now, yet I still recall the tiniest details of her so very long ago.  One of the mysteries of Time, I suppose. 

     Big A is heading off to her first homecoming dance tonight.  Dress shopping last week I had to stand in the back of her, biting my lips, trying to think of the funniest moments that I've ever had and yet, again, more moments that I couldn't recall.  

All I could remember was the first dress that I put on her the day I brought her home from the hospital.  A day that she fit within my arms, a day that she had baby fat and dimpled thighs and the most precious feet and toes.

     "You'll have to give me a break today, kiddo," I said.  "The very first time I held your toes was through my skin, right here.  You were kicking so hard and I actually grabbed your foot."  It was surreal, I told her.  And somehow, not as surreal as that moment with her sitting beside me in the passenger seat, not safely secured behind me in her car seat, where, when I look just right, I can still see her, tiny feet and all.

     I don't remember my mom crying when I went to my first dances.  I look about and I don't see many other mothers crying on the first day of school or at the graduation ceremonies we've had along the way to high school and I wonder what went wrong inside of me; I remember always wondering that...why I would cry so easily, whether at something sad or beautiful or happy, or all of those things.  I thought one day I would have the answer and rather the answer seems farther and farther away. 

     It's rocky, the waters that Big A and I travel, and I am always grateful for the lulls in the winds where the boat can rock gently, as I once rocked her over and over and over until one day I didn't.  

There was nothing special about that day, no warning, no hint; just one day, boom, it hit me as I was washing the dishes, "I didn't rock Big A yesterday." 

 I remember the plate I was washing at that moment.  It had a blue flowered pattern around the outside of it and a single leaf at the very center of it. I remember scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing until there was a little part of the leaf gone.  I remember thinking, "There.  Now you know how it feels to have a part of you missing."  

     I am blinded and dumbfounded by her.  I tell her all the time how amazing I think she is.  Sometimes she looks up at me and murmurs a thank you, sometimes she nods.  I don't know how to make sure she understands what she is to me.  I don't know that there are words for that.

     "It's like when you were born, a little knife was placed inside of my heart," I said as I grasped her hand, "and each moment that you grow, each time that I look at you, it twists a little more."  She doesn't know.  How could she know?  I didn't know, which is, I suppose, why I keep wanting to make her understand.

     It's that today, somehow, the baby that slept upon my chest so soundly just a moment ago is heading off to her first big high school event.  

     I turned my head, just for a moment, and boom......

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Keepsake

In the memoir of my youth, this photo would be the one that I'd select for the chapter entitled, "Birthdays."

My grandmother and I share the same date of our births; it's been one of the greatest gifts I've received. My childhood birthdays were always laced with not just the anticipation of what was within the boxes wrapped for me, but with who would call who first, of what kind of dinner or cake we'd share, what photos we'd take.

I used to live a quarter of a mile from her; I'd spend my summers racing up the hill to her home at the break of dawn and lolly-gag through my days in her gardens, baking with her in the kitchen, journeying into "town" on Fridays to go grocery shopping.

There is a tie between us, a bond of sorts that I cannot put into words, an invisible ribbon wrapped around the gift of our relationship that has bound us together on a dimension that is hard to explain.

This morning when I talked to her to wish her a happy birthday, I felt overwhelmingly sad. I'm sure it was a combination of the miles between, the words unspoken, the whispers in my head wondering how many more of these days we will share; Time reminding me of its existence not just in the mirror, but also within my heart.

It's just an age, right? It's just one more day, right? It isn't a milestone of any matter, a moment that deserves commemorating, it's not something that deserves more than a moments thought. It's not a day that matters in the big picture of things. Once, it was. Once it was balloons and cake and excitement and cheeks flushed pink with the anticipation of what was to come.

Today it wasn't. Today it was heavy and hard and honestly, scary. It wasn't a day that I wanted to commit to the scrapbook of my life, a photo that I wanted to frame, a day that I wanted to celebrate. Those days, I believe, are gone.

And if I could have anything for my gift today, it would be to have just one of those back.

****
Comments off....really, I don't want a pity party; just a place to put these words and thoughts, and I apologize for their weight.

Six

The day passed as quickly as the six years we celebrated. I'm left here tonight; wondering where the time went--yes, still I wonder--even after all of this time that has passed within just a moment.

Six was hard, knowing that it was the end of Five. It hit me like the moment that I gave back the bassinet that I had slept in as a child; knowing that there would be no more of my children sleeping in it. I always said the years between three and five were my favorite; those years are gone now.

Already just in this year between birthday cakes she has lost nearly all of her words that were said incorrectly; the "w's" are rarely placed where the "l's" belong anymore. I remember the look on a friends face when I corrected her as she corrected Little A for saying "wike" instead of "like".

"No; it's OK--I hardly have any of that left," I'd said. In my mind there was a memory of that old wooden bassinet; my sobs as I hauled it down the stairs; there was a memory of how tiny she once was; how truly small her hands were when I held them in mine. Her sweet mispronounced words were the parts of that woven wooden baby bed that had remained.

She awoke today with a sense of age, "It is very different than five," she explained.

"How?"

"Mom, it's seriously so much older than five. How can you be an adult an' not know that?"

"Mumma knows that, silly." And her braid became tighter in my hands as all of her blond hair fell together into just a motion, a memory, a prayer. "Turn your head this way, baby." We turned away from the mirror before us, time and tears woven into a plait of hope and sunshine.

If I were to tell the absolute truth of Six, the first word would be this image:


It's one thing to write of her story here; it is another to open my hands and show you what I hold within them. For her end of the year project in kindergarten, they had to create a timeline and she needed a photo of when she was born.

"Is that me?" She had asked, her eyes focused upon the picture, confusion clouding the blue of her stare. "It is, buddy." "What was wrong with me?" "Nothing," I'd said. "You were just very, very tiny and had a lot of things that doctors had to work on for a long time." I explained that her body needed time to catch up to her soul. She smiled when I said that. "Well, I'm super fast so can you even believe how much I caught up to it? Isn't that funny, Ma? Isn't that crazy? How did I even do that so fast?"

The truth of Six is that I once thought Six would never come, just as I thought One would never come; just as I worried that one week, then two weeks, then a month would never come. The truth of Six is that despite the force that she is, she is also still that tiny prayer inside of a NICU to me. I held her in one hand and now I'm releasing her to the world with both. It's hard for me and I wish it weren't, but damn if Six doesn't make it so much harder than Five.

We were talking about her birthday a few days ago, when I joked with her (as I always do) that if she would just quit growing I'd feel so much better. "Ma, I'm gonna grow, OK. I have to. I need to drive a car and get groceries. But I'm gonna stick around, OK? You're gonna see me, OK? But I'm gonna grow, OK? Seriously, I have to."

Of course she has to grow. Of course I am blessed each day that she does. Of course I should have let go of Five with more dignity than I did and I should have greeted Six with a smile and an open door rather than sobbing on the phone with my sister hiding behind the door of my bathroom.

Six was the best birthday ever, according to her. It arrived as friends were pulling out of our driveway at midnight after a night of catching fireflies and making s'mores. We spent most of Six in the sun at the beach. I've been awake for most of Six, but I feel like only a minute has passed.

I asked her what her favorite part of the day was as I was hugging her goodnight. "Remember today when I was really afraid ta go in the lake and ya kept sayin' 'it's OK, Momma is here' and then you kept letting me ride on your back and taking little steps with me and then finally I was like, 'OK, people, I'm swimmin' and I started swimming? Do you remember that?"

"Of course I do, silly, it just happened today."

"Well that was my favorite part, when I was huggin' ya like really tight and ya kept sayin' 'you can do it' and then I did. When I did it, that was my favorite part. And now I'm a lake swimmer, of course."

"What was your favorite part?" she whispered. "When I watched you swimming away like such a big girl," I whispered back.

"Did I look like a really big girl when I did that?" "Like the biggest six year old ever," I said. "I'm really tired, Momma. I have ta go to bed now so I can swim tomorrow."

I hugged her as tight as I could and tucked her in between her two best friends. I smiled sincerely, with all of my soul, at them as I pulled the door shut. I rested my head up against it for a minute and stood there, softly closing a different door in my mind where a tiny baby that fit within the palm of my hand laid within a different bed, machines whirring and humming around her. It probably won't be the last time that I close that door, but I'm determined to try to open it less.

I can't keep worrying about what was and I don't have time to worry about what will be; I have a six year old to take care of now, ya' know?

----

The End

When I was one I had just begun
When I was two I was nearly new

When I was three I was hardly me
When I was four I was not much more

When I was five I was just alive
But now I am six, I'm as clever as clever;

So I think I'll be six now for ever and ever.

A.A. Milne

Waiting On Hope

"Poverty doesn't give you strength or teach you lessons about perseverance. No, poverty only teaches you how to be poor."
Sherman Alexie, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

--------

In my mind, I've written at least ten posts about L. I am surprised to come back here and find that I haven't transposed any of those words to this place, when I can read them so clearly in my mind.

The first post dedicated to him was when I first met him and he had no identification at all. "Your mom doesn't have a copy of your birth certificate? Your social security card?" He shook his head. "I got nothing."

He couldn't get his school records without identification. He couldn't get identification without two forms of photo identification. He couldn't get photo identification without some verification of his identity.

I carefully watched the employees behind the counter at the Secretary of State the day that I went there with him, a copy of a birth certificate in hand when we technically needed an original. "Please," I said and then later made jokes about what a good pair of hooker boots will do for you when really I knew to the core of my being that it was what someone with a good heart would do for you.

I have to make jokes, you know, because if I don't I feel overwhelmed sometimes with the emotion of it all.

"All of this," L said that day as I drove him home, "All of this just to prove that I exist?" I made some remark that made him laugh as my hands gripped the wheel as tight as they could and I choked on the sob rising in my throat.

About a month later, L. had an interview scheduled. The employer called me to tell me that they had filled the position the day before he was to go in; the day that I had left a message for her explaining that I was working with him. When L. called to check in about the interview, I had to tell him that the position was no longer open.

He didn't respond. "L?" I asked. And at the other end, I heard him weeping. There are not words to explain what that did to me, and still I urged him to hold on; that hope was right around the corner. And it was. That day.

L. has been working for nearly six weeks now. It took him all this time to save up $510 to pay off two tickets that he'd gotten in 2008. Before you make a judgment, let me tell you about the tickets. He was pulled over for a muffler that was too loud. A muffler that he knew was too loud, but that he couldn't afford to fix. He was ticketed for that muffler and for not having his proof of insurance on him. He couldn't afford to pay for them; if he could have afforded that, he would have fixed his muffler.

Again, with they cycles, the circles.
In Michigan, if your license is suspended, you have to pay your fines, a reinstatement fee ($150) and a "driver responsibility fee" ($600-minimum) to get your license back.

The bus doesn't go near where L. works, so he has to get off the bus a mile and a half from there and walk the rest of the way. He still goes. He believes that this is the way out from where he is from. I am not sure anymore if there is a way out, but I'm going to keep acting like I do. I don't know anything else.

When I found out about the additional fees today, I was struggling to compose myself when my phone rang. It was him. I delivered the news in fragments, in a way that wouldn't allow him to fully process it, and I knew it, but I don't feel like he can process it right now.

His counselor and I sat later today as she wracked her brain with ways to help and I mostly sat there watching her, nodding my head, running circles in my brain. There are a couple of possible leads, but they are small and unlikely. Probably as small and unlikely as the possibility of a kid who was raised in "the system", who knows nothing but poverty, who bears the demons of his father in the long and jagged scar that rises angrily across cheek getting up every day, hours before he has to be to work, to get to work.

He doesn't have someone in his life that has given him the example of holding a steady job. He doesn't have someone in his life that taught him to keep his social security card or who kept his birth certificate or who made sure he went to school. He doesn't have someone in his life who can even be relied upon to pick him up on time on Sunday morning when the bus doesn't run to help him get to work.

"Do you have a hero, L.?" The manager asked during his interview. "I'd have to say God," he answered. "Do you have anyone, like a person in your life that you look up to or that has helped you?" He looked at his hands and then said, "Just Jenn. She's about the only person that's ever helped me in my life, ma'am." And I made a joke about that not being a good thing, and we all laughed and the manager readjusted papers that didn't need readjusting and I shifted in my chair and I smiled at L. and we walked out and I told him that it would all be O.K., that this was the beginning of things changing.

I believed that when I said it.

I hope, with all that I have left in me, that I will believe that again tomorrow morning.

I hope that somehow his counselor (one of those vastly overpaid civil servants that went into public service to become rich and live the high life off of our tax dollars) finds an answer that has been overlooked; placed in a corner somewhere and forgotten; a ten dollar bill in the pocket of a coat that hasn't been worn in a couple of years.

I hope that tomorrow when I talk to L. that I will be able to tell him that things have been figured out and that all of his efforts haven't been for nothing; that he can finally quit waiting on hope and instead bask in the light of its' arrival.

----

"Hope is necessary in every condition. The miseries of poverty, sickness, of captivity, would, without this comfort, be insupportable." Samuel Johnson

Thirteen

Big A,

Thirteen.

You are thirteen; more improbable than this is the fact that I have a child that is thirteen; these are not the same thing although it may seem as though they are.

I say it so often, but I have to say it again: I have no idea where the time has gone. I now know firsthand the secret told in the glances of my grandparents and parents, my aunts and uncles: that there is no answer, that they stood there, too, in wonder of where time went, trying to sort out how the people before them looked so different than the people within them.

It's hard, I know, Big A. I must tell you I thought it would be so much easier. I thought that when Thirteen arrived that we would be the best of friends and would meld into one another, simple, curved shapes that were difficult to tell from the other. It isn't that, and that truth is hard. It's all sharp edges and muscles tightened from walking on tiptoes throughout our lives right now.

It's hard to be your mom when I want to be your friend...I am told that the friendship will come in later years, when the innocence and bravado of youth wears a little and shadows begin to fall on the knowledge of all that you thought that you knew. I cannot wait for that time, and yet, if I could shield you from that time, I would as well.

When I tell you that your entire life is before you and that each moment matters, it is because I ignored those exact words of those before me and I look back on that oldest truth with a mix of curiosity and regret--the truth that youth is wasted on the young.

If I were gone tomorrow, I would want you to know how very much I love you. How despite the tension now, that the moment each morning when I see your sleepy face, that each time I am overcome with how much I love you.

I would want to tell you to dive for every ball. To go for it, whatever it is, with all that there is within you. To not wait until you think it will be safe--safety is overrated and not as secure as you would believe. I would want you to know that I never regretted trying and not succeeding, but that I always regretted not trying.

I would want you to know that we really are all just hanging by a thread and that that thread is interwoven among mankind; all of us. That a second, even a part of a second, can make all the difference in the world. That the smallest act can have the most significant impact. That life as you know it could be life as you knew it within the blink of an eye. I would tell you to be the one to let go last when hugging someone.

Punctuation does matter and no matter what, there are two spaces after a period. Floss then brush. Think then speak. Guard the plate with two strikes and if it's close, you better be swinging. Make your free-throws.

Duke and The Yankees are of the same evil empire. Cloud-watching is an art. Be kind. Be true.

You are a love letter written across my soul, sweet girl, with words that I cannot express or understand, but know just the same.

Happy Thirteen, Big A.

Love,

Your adoring mother

On The Eve of 38

The eve of 38.

Preposterous, no?

It is to me, when I try to imagine it; when I'm lying in bed, thinking of all that I want to do with my life and the goals that I have, drawn fresh on the chalkboard of my mind. And then I go to rise and my knees ache and the mirror reminds me that no, this is not an innocent fresh-faced woman standing, looking out on the world.

And I smile softly and say a silent prayer of thanks that I have this day, this life.

I recall being a child, looking at the adults around me and thinking how easy it must be, how there must be a day that it all falls together and your life hums softly along and you are happy with you and your insecurities vanish and you become a grown person, that it all must somehow work out.

Now, of course, on the eve of 38, I see things differently. I can see the strains that didn't make a blip on my radar; I can hear whispers outside, a hot summer night, cousins sprawled across one another indoors as a marriage was breaking right outside the rainbows on the ceiling of our youth; we were all oblivious. It's hard, I know now, to compose yourself enough to walk into a house and put on a smile and carry on. But you do.

I remember longing for things that I didn't understand.

I remember thinking that if I were a better person, if I were smarter, if I were faster, if I were something more, then I would matter and there would be a magical moment when suddenly all of the bottled up ache and frustration and sorrow disappeared and was replaced with love.

It's hard for me that I still think these things; it would enrage me, I believe, if rage were still buried within me. Time does that, I suppose; takes the rough edges and sands them down, little by little, until you become very careful, very suddenly aware, that with all the whittling away, there are very few breaks that you can withstand much more. And you begin to let go of the things that break you.

I think of those that I love and I wonder if our children look at us and believe this myth; this lie of perfection and I would express wholeheartedly with all that is left in me, "I hope not."

It's not what Big A wants to hear, I know; that I am not perfect, that I am flawed and that I do not know the answers and that I'm just trying the best that I can. Who wants their parents to be riddled with confusion when you are so riddled with it yourself? I remember the brink of 13, where she stands now, and that makes me feel older than my knees and my wrinkles and the realization that all of the songs that I sincerely love are two decades old.

Here, on the eve of 38, I can tell you that what I've learned is probably so much of a lesser thing than all that I don't know. I can tell you that I've lived through days and nights that I could not have ever imagined living through, that there are wounds that are still as fresh as the day they were born, that there are miracles and sunrises and that there is so much beauty around me that it makes me weep, nearly on a daily basis.

I can tell you that there are people that I've met in an instant that I've known for a lifetime and people that I've known for a lifetime that I've never even known.

I can tell you that in my carefully crafted plans, 38 looked like a white picket fence and an accomplished legal and writing career and an SUV with smiling children. It didn't look like this; what 38 really is.

And for that, I am so, so grateful.

It is the eve of 38, and for the first time in my life, I can sincerely tell you that I'm good with me. I wouldn't want to be younger; I wouldn't want to go back.

And that makes me happy and makes me sad and makes me wish that I could take what I finally know and bottle it up and give it away to all of the people, children and adults, that right now are waiting for that moment when it all makes sense. I would tell them, "The time is now" and hug them and send them out into a brighter day.

But it is the eve of 38, and I know where those silly little hopes and dreams belong. And I am smiling as I tell you that knowing that they reside within me still is by far one of the greatest gifts I've ever received.

Oh, 38. You've got nothing on me.