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I Knew They Would Break My Heart

Tuesday, January 9th, 2018

Truth is, I knew the Bulldogs were going to break my heart.

I knew because it was the logical end to the worst year of my life, the one where i met disappointment and fear and pain at every turn. The one where i just slogged through 365 days in a row, hoping it would soon be over and sometimes not caring how.

It’s behind me now, the hell that i went through in the last year. I did the right thing, and the hard thing, and I walked out of my house one morning and knew my life and the lives of those I loved would be changed irrevocably forever. And I knew that I had to do it to save myself physically and mentally, and to have a chance at saving us all. It didn’t work, not the way I thought it would, but i don’t regret trying. I did it and it didn’t work out and the world did not completely fall apart, even though there have been moments where it felt like it would.

I made it through the weirdness of living in a basement for 9 months, the shared silent house split right down the middle in alternating nights at home and nights making myself scarce, through the cold division of everything two people put together over 18 years, the day we told the kids, the signing of the papers, the waiting, and the terrifying unknowns of where i would be living. I lived through the constant deflection of my family’s worry, my fear for my children’s well-being.

I lived through the surreal and daunting prospect of buying a house before I was really ready, the packing, the moving, the friend who just didn’t show up for me when I needed them most, the realization that they never would, and the friends who did show up whom I can never repay and to whom I am forever indebted. I lived through the vomiting, the sleeplessness, the ulcers, the near-debilitating sadness and depression, the million ways i numbed myself with drinks or food or tv or sleep.

I lived through the mortifying shame and guilt and self-hatred, and through other people’s pity and “I’m so sorry”s, their tears and their questions. I lived through those last weeks, packing the bare minimum and dumping it into a new and empty house, all while my job went completely to shit, i worked weekends and nights, and I found out I would have to drive to my office in every day, adding ten to 15 hours to my work week, and that i had only a few months to work out my childcare arrangements.

I made it through an August that felt like one never-ending horrible nightmare, one I could not wake up from, one that to get through felt like barely keeping my head above water in an ocean of cement, my eyes constantly on the horizon. If I could just get there, I might be able to breathe again, and maybe sleep, and stop trying to not feel anything.

I dumped all the boxes in the new house, received my final divorce decree two days later, woke up the next morning and flew to NYC, where I spent the first 12 days of my divorce almost completely alone in a city where you are never alone. I came home, and I started putting things together, getting used to my new normal, our new schedules, the homework and the dawning realization that this is real and it is forever and something I loved very much is dead.

I lived through the first week without kids, a very weird Halloween, a child’s birthday party as a single mom, the carpools juggled, and the feeling of having to do every possible excruciating red tape insurance/governmental/financial/legal/household task I have ever done, in my whole life, all in a month.

I lived through the first holidays – Thanksgiving without kids, Christmas eve playing Santa all by myself, Christmas night with no kids for the first time since my son was born, and the New Year’s Eve sadness of being alone, of going home alone.

I have never felt so relieved, for a year to be over and a new one to begin. And I have been positive and healthy, a little bit more every day. I have been getting back on my feet. In 2018, I have already achieved something i did not achieve in all of 2017 (and most of 2016, for that matter); I have had whole days where I did not break down in tears.

I woke up new, on New Year’s Day. And I know now something that I doubted for a very long time. The truth is, when it comes to pushing through the pain and the stagnation and the fear, I am strong. When it comes to realizing and seeking and speaking the truth, I am one badass motherfucker.

I knew there would be more hurdles and I knew i would clear them.

So, I watched with growing amusement that my bulldogs were gaining ground, that they might make the big game. I realized that it would be hilarious for them to make the big game. We had sent my ex to the big game in California a few years before (different team for those non-readers); we had agreed if my team ever went, we would make sure i got to go too. But that wouldn’t happen now.

So, of course, after 37 years, the Bulldogs made it to a national championship. I could see it coming from a mile away. i enjoyed it, it helped me get through the first holidays on my own, and it was one happy thing in a sea of (mostly) pain. I started laughingly telling people that I wasn’t bothering hoping they would make it to the big game, but if they did make it, it would end in heartbreak. I knew not to bother daring to believe, because I knew it would not end well. I knew that the real poetic cap to my year was one last kick in the teeth.

And that’s just exactly what happened. There was no other ending that would have fit as well. Because every time that I have been down this past year, i thought, “This must be it. Rock bottom. This must be what rock bottom feels like.” And then something else would happen and i would just laugh hysterically that I thought it could actually be over, get better, that I might, just might, catch a break.

So, people will have to cut me some slack when I say that I am not quite happy and accepting of that loss yet. It wasn’t just a football game – it was wrapped up in a whole lot more for me. It sure would have been nice to have that game go my way, to have just one goddamn thing go my way.

The truth is, though, it would have been too perfect, too pat a hand, to finish it all off with a win. And now that loss is already in the yesterdays, with all the other losses I’ve experienced. Now I’m in the present, the today. i get to leave behind hope and expectation, and just take this new life one day at a time. I can leave the mistakes behind, stop looking forward with some endgame in mind, and concentrate on making each day good and seeing what happens. I have a white, bright 2018 ahead of me, full of possibility and new adventure and challenges, and most of all of just being with myself, the me that I almost lost in the last couple of years, without all the noise of the crowd.

(But i probably could have done all that with a W, too. Just sayin,’ Universe.)

Tags: Broken Heart, Bulldogs, Football, national championship 2017, New Beginnings
Posted in Angst, Divorce, Family, Football, Friends, Georgia, Health and Fitness, Life | 3 Comments »

Of Tears, Trains, and the Spirit of the Radio

Tuesday, June 27th, 2017

Tags: Crying, Rush, Trains
Posted in Angst, Beauty, College, Family, Life, Music, Musings, Parenthood, Rollie, Tiller, todd, Tucker | No Comments »

Of Tears, Trains, and the Spirit of the Radio

Tuesday, June 27th, 2017

I went to bed in a cloud of melancholy. I woke up the same. I cried my way to work. (40 minutes is sometimes just the right amount of time to think. Sometimes it is way too much time.) I usually am really good at compartmentalizing, but today I did a terrible job. I ended up crying in the grassy area behind my building, choking sobs back, rubbing at my eyes with my sleeve, pacing, giving myself the pull-it-together talk. I am really good at pulling it together; I was not able to do so this morning.

I somehow made it through the day. I sat in an hour and a half of traffic. I called two friends and two cousins. I left messages for them. I thought of people I desperately wished I could talk to about everything. I didn’t call them. Part of me thought I should. I called my Mama instead. She picked up, just like always.

I came home and I ran 2+ miles. It was my fastest pace in a long time. I must be running from something. It is like a soothing drug. Squats and crunches and planks are not soothing, but I did those too, because I don’t know what else to do with myself.

It was my turn to do kid duty. I took T. and her friend, M., to eat. It was about 8 pm. They were excited to tell me about their day. They gushed about Cars 3, which evidently has a female protagonist. I guess I will have to see it now, despite the fact that I wanted to shoot myself over all the Lightning McQueen stuff R. loved as a little boy. I miss that age now. I miss Mater, that old goofball.

The girls talked about how to pick a college. (My take was go in state, try to get some scholarships, and avoid loans, if possible, but mostly to just learn everything they can now, and make the best grades they can, and seek out the things that interest them. That would give them options, and the rest would fall into place, and that not everyone decides to college and that is okay too, but it is important to give yourself the option.)

Then we talked about financial security, and about how money isn’t about new shoes or how big your house is. It’s about freedom. Money sometimes = freedom. I also had this talk with my first love’s mother, right after we broke up, in maybe 1993. She liked me, I guess. She invited me to lunch. She gave me Gloria Steinem’s “Revolution From Within.” I may have frightened the girls when I told them that being financially stable was important for women, so that they never had to stay with an *abusive man. That they could always take care of themselves. Sorry, Megan and Andy – #notaprofessionalguidancecounselor

I talked to the waiter about his breakup with his boyfriend. He is maybe 21? I told him he’d live, but it might hurt like hell and feel like death.

We paid the check and walked out into the near-dark. It was cool for June, and we sat and listened to the quiet on main street for a minute. Tiller ran around and up and down the ramp and stairs with her arms out like an airplane. She laughed as she ran. She snorts when she laughs.

The train track signal lights started flashing and the crossing bars went down. The girls yelled, “Train!” and we walked to our car, next to the tracks. I gave both a leg up onto the hood of the car, and they sat on top under the quarter moon and we waited for the engine. It parked and we sat. (I stood. I am too old to jump onto a hood and not fall immediately back off and the whole patio of the restaurant was watching; I only made one attempt. I am going to practice that, though.)

And then it started. Just a single engine, alone, pulling no cars behind it. The girls waved. The driver waved back, not 15 feet away. He blew the whistle. Twice. We all clapped and cheered. The crossing opened back up and the bells went off. We got back in the car, now in the dark. We rolled the windows down.

Rush’s “Spirit of the Radio” was on. I’m not a big Rush fan, but I talked to them about Neal Peart and we rolled the windows down and opened the sunroof and they both put their faces out the windows as I turned onto the main road, as we drove past each streetlight, in and out of alternating darkness and light.

And somehow, at that moment, I realized the day had turned out alright. We would be alright.

* Hypothetical. My husband is not, nor has he ever been, abusive. He is the person I respect most in the world.

Tags: Crying, Rush, Trains
Posted in Angst, Beauty, College, Family, Life, Music, Musings, Parenthood, Rollie, Tiller, todd, Tucker | 3 Comments »

Empty House, Full of Prophetic Dreams

Tuesday, May 30th, 2017

This dream was lost to me until a conversation reminded me of it, but it’s horror is so unusual for me, I wanted to write it down. It seemed crazy and out of nowhere at the time, and then upon further reflection, it made all the scary sense in the world. Sometimes dreams mirroring real life before it happens can be most terrifying of all.

I’m in the house he and I first lived in together. It is furnished just the same. A veterinarian lives there now, with her husband and pets, and they made it a bigger house, but in my dream it is the same small one he and I shared.

He is gone. I wander through the rooms, looking in each one, even in the closets and behind the shower curtain. I look out into the yard, on the screen porch that does not exist anymore, the one where he held the kitten in his coat while we smoked cigarettes, the one where he brought me home the puppy. He is not there.

I walk back into the room, and there is an old friend. He smiles and I am happy to see him and to hear his voice. I have missed him and worried about him. He goes to the bathroom. I notice his friend sitting there on my couch. I thought they weren’t friends anymore. I thought they had a falling out. I am glad to see him, too, and I tell him:

“I am glad to see you, but I’m surprised you’re back.”

“I’m back for a reason,” he says, and there is meaning, but I cannot decipher it.

Our friend walks back in the room. He is ashen, grayish, emaciated, and no longer wearing a shirt, only too-large jeans held up only by a belt. He looks at me with sorry eyes, and he drops to his knees, and opens his mouth to say something, but all that comes out is blood, all over our old carpet and his own porcelain white chest.

Posted in Angst, Death, Dreams, Marriage, Writing | No Comments »

Living in the Middle Place

Monday, May 29th, 2017

A 6 a.m. bolt of lightning struck me awake yesterday morning. I sat straight up in bed. I got up and looked out into the storm. I climbed back into bed and tucked the covers tightly around, whispering to the shaking, terrified dog by my bed,

“It’s okay, baby. Everything will be alright.”

I fell back to sleep, but in that high-level dreaming state that one has in the mornings, drifting in and out of sleep, where life and dream weave together.

I forgot about my vivid dreaming until I read this article this morning, and the line “Fuck the Patriarchy” echoed in my head. I thought the article was well-written, and it echoes what I hear a lot of women talking about recently. Reading that reminded me instantly of the same words in my dream.

I dreamt I was in a school, maybe a college. I was a student, somehow, and the classrooms looked like the ones in my middle school growing up. Students were assembling in the room for a political debate. I was wearing cut off jeans, and a t-shirt and dark hoodie. In the pocket of my jeans, I stuffed a stack of political postcards. The postcards caused the pocket to poke out below the cutoff hem of the jeans, their sharp corners jutting into my thigh. I sat in a hard school chair, with a backpack at my side, my legs stretched out in front of me, my feet in black chucks.

A man in a suit approached me, his finger pointed at my lap, punctuating the air.

“You can’t have those in here!” I pulled the postcards out of my pocket, slipped them into my backpack. “No!,” he yells. “You have to wear pants!”

Anger welled up in me. I snatched up my backpack, slinging it over my shoulder and went to another classroom to find pants in my closet. (It’s a dream; Yes, my closet was in the other classroom. I don’t know why.) I walked into the room, the whole time muttering, “Fuck the Patriarchy.” I went to the closet, a whole class watching me, as I rolled open the doors, and started rifling through the stacks of pants on a shelf.

I couldn’t find my jeans, the ones with the rip at the knee. There were only men’s jeans and pants. I realized it was my husband’s closet. I couldn’t find any jeans of my own. I angrily put on a too-large pair of hiking-style pants, with zippers that allow you to unzip the legs and make the pants into shorts. Even the sound of the synthetic material rubbing together at the thighs when I walked back to the debate angered me. I guess I woke up, then, to the storms and light getting brighter in my room.

I try very hard to look on the positive side of things, to find joy and exhibit gratitude in my day-to-day dealings. But I also sometimes struggle a bit with a molten anger, just waiting for a crack in the crust to pour up through. Still, I don’t want to be angry. Not being angry is a decision. One I try to make daily. Sometimes I fail. I am not angry at men. I am not angry at my husband. But I am angry at something. Society? As the author, Catherine Newman, wrote:

I don’t always feel just one way. I’m not always sure. And maybe that’s what it is to be a grown-up—living in the middle place, where you can’t decide quickly about everything. A misanthrope, in love with the world.

In my dream, though, I was shaking and angry and sure. In the morning light, I’m just living in the middle place.

Tags: dreams
Posted in Angst, Life, Musings, Politics, Writing | 1 Comment »

Pride, Humility, Change, Gratitude, Acceptance, Truth

Sunday, May 28th, 2017

This kid. Like most people, I post about the good stuff that happens with my kids. Like when he went to the county for the spelling bee. (That’s him with his certificate in the photo.) Or the funny stuff, like when out of nowhere, he asked me about very explicit sex stuff in front of the waiter at a restaurant a couple months ago. Stuff like that. The stuff that entertains and brings joy and laughter and that, for some kids, comes easy. Spelling comes pretty easy to my kid. So does his unabashed open and honest curiosity, and a willingness to talk about stuff people like to pretend don’t exist or at least those subjects that people are uncomfortable talking about. And I want him to be able to talk to me about stuff.

But this year is a little different. This year wasn’t all good. This year, he took on a pretty hard math class, and he struggled a little bit for the first time. He said things like, “I’m not good at math.” He also struggled with disorganization. He struggled with motivation. He didn’t turn all his homework in. He didn’t like ELA (that’s English to us old folks) any more. He still read constantly for pleasure, but he wasn’t enjoying school. At one point during progress reports, he had a failing grade in more than one class. (He may have gotten that from his mother, too, admittedly. Genetics are a bitch.) He had been scared to tell us he was struggling and things spiraled and we had no idea.

So, we told him he could always tell us anything. And then we buckled down. He lost some privileges and we set guidelines for what we expected out of him. We also, concerned about his motivation about school, suggested to him that he might want to consider applying to a theme school for the arts. We took him to the school to learn more about it. He learned about the academic requirements for getting in and staying in the school.

We saw a change in him. He was inspired by the students who talked about school and how much they liked it. He decided to apply. He worked on the application himself. He prepared for the music audition and put together writing samples, and sought out recommendations from teachers and counselors. He auditioned and got a spot, knowing that he could not go to the school if he didn’t get his grades back up.

And he did. He got his grades back up. Not all the way to all As and Bs all year, as he’s gotten in the past, but enough to keep him eligible. He worked hard at it.

So, it was odd to see him walk across the honors stage and just get the one award for the spelling bee. The one he didn’t have to work that hard to get, because it comes naturally to him. (Not that we weren’t immensely happy with that award too – we were.) But just the one – No Principal’s award, or Cougar of the Year (no laughing), or Scholar’s awards. And it was actually the proudest I’ve ever been of him, knowing how much he worked this year, knowing that he finally struggled and faced some adversity and he rose to the occasion, even if they don’t give awards for that. Knowing that he wanted something and he worked for it.* (Side note: How many other kids faced adversity and came out the better for it and never got a certificate or accolades for it? Guess that’s a post for another time.)

I was proud of me, too. It’s been a rough year for me. The roughest one I have had yet in my life, by a mile. I suspect that I will have harder ones. I’m proud of the fact that even when preoccupied with all of the other work/life/health issues my family dealt with, that we as parents didn’t drop the ball on supporting the kids.

I’m proud of what I’ve learned about life and about myself. I’m learning to be okay with getting by, with being thankful for my two healthy children. They don’t need to be child prodigies, Einsteins, stars, best in class, fastest, brightest, anythingest. They just need to know that I will love and support them, no matter what. Heck. I’m an adult and I needed to hear that lately from people I love.

Difficulty can make one stronger, but I was already pretty strong. Difficulty actually brought me to my knees and humbled me and taught me about getting to the other side, and about acceptance. I’ve learned to be more open-minded, less judgmental, to see more than one side of things, to not make assumptions. I’ve learned that even really good, smart, decent, loving, respectful people make mistakes or become bogged down in things they cannot for the life of them figure out how they got into in the first place, and that they are often right there in the muck of it all with other good people, all of them and everyone around them unable to face, much less say, their truth. Instead they can’t figure out how to communicate, so they shut down and numb themselves with the thought that what they’re feeling is normal. I know now that you can bury a feeling with all you’ve got, but it will find a course out into the light.

I’ve realized that the most I can do is try to rectify wrongs and the things I’ve left unsaid, and if I can’t fix them, at least I can acknowledge them. I realize that some things just happen and there isn’t a discernible reason. That coincidence or fate or happenstance are all just words for change and change is inevitable. That some things cannot be prevented; That some things cannot be fixed. That sometimes all you can do is be honest with yourself and those around you, and then hope for the best. That sometimes what you get is not what you might have wanted, but that you might be amazed at and admire how people handle things and what they give back to you. That you end up respecting them more for hearing your truth, and telling you theirs.

I’ve learned that being honest is more valuable than acting out of fear. I’ve learned that fear is often just being scared of hurting those we love, or of losing their love or admiration. That sometimes you find yourself in a mess because you were trying not to hurt or lose others. But when you put honesty out, you will likely get it back tenfold, even if it is painful and scary to hear. And you will know how to proceed. You find a place where you realize that everything will be okay, except when it’s not, and you’ll get through that too, hopefully with some semblance of grace and peace. (And hopefully with more yoga and less wine.)

I’ve learned that all the facades and paths and channels and expectations we are given are just guidelines and that I have to make my own way, because there is no one right way to live, and that my way is truth. When I follow the truth in my head, heart, and gut, the gnawing, sick, churning and burning in my very bones will go quiet and I will know which direction to take.

Truth is, deep down I knew it all along: I just never had it tested in such a complete and totally tectonic plate-shifting way until now.

And so I sat in that gym today, watching my boy walk across the stage and afterwards, I hugged him and told him I loved him, and took his photo out in a sunny courtyard, and I felt a peace and gratitude that I have not felt in a long while. Sure, he’s the best speller. But more importantly, he’s good enough at all the other stuff. And I’m good enough too, even if I am not the most perfect daughter, sister, wife, mother, friend, employee. I’m good enough if I actively seek my truth, and support those who seek their own truths, even if they are different than mine.

If you are reading this, and you need to hear it, know this: You are good enough, too. Just follow your truth.

*Bold, because if he reads this, I want him to see that I was immensely proud of him today, and that he inspired this post, and that I want him to always follow his truth.

Tags: truth
Posted in Angst, Beauty, Education, Family, Life, Marriage, Musings, Parenthood, Rollie, Writing | 2 Comments »

Not Truly Broken

Saturday, May 27th, 2017

When that personwho has known you your whole life says exactly the right thing.

Tags: Not Broken
Posted in Angst, Beauty, Life, Marriage | No Comments »

Change is Not Always Linear

Friday, January 20th, 2017

This morning, I woke up to so much sadness and shock and dismay all over social media that Yes, this is really happening. A reality TV show star, completely unqualified for the position in too many ways to count, will actually be sworn in as President of the United States of America.

I am not one to share every bit of outrageous news that I see on Facebook. I rarely share political items. In this political environment, If I posted every time I was upset or scared or angry or outraged, I would be posting ten to fifteen times a day. (Side note: I respect the right to speak out, but I fear the deluge of shared content contributes to overwhelm, desensitization, and normalization of the outrageous things happening in our world.) As a dear friend of mine said recently while discussing feeling inundated by the constant flood of information,

“I feel like I (we) are in a huge sandstorm, and the source of the storm is the turbulent funnel within. I do better focusing on the funnel rather than all of the sand, if that makes sense.”

Honestly, I am not shocked or depressed anymore. Am I happy about him being president? No. Am I still appalled at everything he has said? Yes. Is my reaction to this president different than it would have been for any other Republican winner? Most definitely.

But there is hope for those all over America (and the world) who are hurt, scared, and angry today.

Tags: change, Donald Trump, Racism, The Atlanta March for Social Justice and Women
Posted in Angst, Atlanta, Georgia, Musings, Nature, Politics | 4 Comments »

Almost Thirteen: Caught Between What’s Right & Your Kid Not Hating You

Monday, August 15th, 2016

I took the kids to dinner tonight. (El Mat, our go-to Mexican place. We’re regulars; we actually get The Usual.) So, I was tired and a little stressed, but I always try to put down the phone and listen when the kids are talking about school. And tonight, for whatever reason, The Boy brought up a kid at school. We’ll call him, “M.”

The boy: “Remember when I told you about M last year? He was kind of a bad kid?”

I say yes, and the conversation flows and somehow we end up talking about kids in his class and one kid in particular. This kid, The Boy says, is kind of special. You can tell he doesn’t really know how to talk about a kid who’s different. I think the words he used were, “He’s, like, special needs?” And so we discussed how that could mean a lot of different things, both physical and mental, etc.

Well, long story shorty, he tells me about this kid in his math class. The Boy believes he is special because, “The teachers are really, really nice to him, and they give him special assignments.” That could mean anything, but obviously, this kid is different and that is apparent to the other kids in the class.

We discuss that maybe he’s on the spectrum somehow, and that it just means that his brain works differently, and maybe he processes things differently than other kids.

And then The Boy says, “Yeah, but some kids pick on him. They throw things at him. He doesn’t look people in the eye. I don’t know if it is how his brain is, or if it’s his thick glasses.”

Sigh.

So, I say, “You know that is completely and totally wrong, right? And that you need to be nice to that kid? In front of the other kids. They need to see you be nice to that kid.”

I’m not good at subtlety. Every freaking wrong I endured in middle school came rushing back and spewed out in two or three sentences uttered in complete and total seriousness to my son.

I could tell it made him uncomfortable. I remembered what it was like to be 12-almost-13 and know, deep down, that something was really wrong, but be afraid to speak up.

I asked him questions about which class it was, and who the kids were who were doing it. I made a mental note of the names. I texted the commune and confirmed what I already knew: That it was not okay to out these kids to a parent social group on Facebook. But, I thought: What if I just said to the group, “Hey, if your kids are on this team, and they are in this particular Math Class, please talk to them about bullying. My child has witnessed this happening.”

I sat on it, finished my margarita. I talked to my son on the way home. I told him that maybe we should say something. He begged me not to. I explained my plan, to just put it out without naming names. But he’s not stupid, my kid. He said, “But they will know you are my mom. They will know I am the one who said something about it to my mom.”

FUCK.

I told him I’d think about it, and I wasn’t going to do anything without talking to him, and I wouldn’t post anything. I told my husband. He said I should talk to the teacher first.

So, I decided I’d sit on it tonight. Let it rest in that place of patience where things sometimes work themselves out. Sometimes that place doesn’t achieve a damn thing, and the pain just sits, but at least in my old age, I know that there are some instances where patience and doing nothing actually contribute to solving everything.

And then I have a beer, talk to a friend, and then check Facebook. And what is the first thing that I see? This post about a thirteen year old who commits suicide after being mercilessly bullied. My son will be 13 in 12 days. I don’t really believe in religion, or God, but I do believe in Karma and in The Universe. And I often wonder, when I’m grappling with something, how The Universe can know to serve me up something so fitting?

This is long, but if you are a parent, I think you should watch it. I haven’t decided what to do yet about my son’s revelations, but I felt like I needed to share this parent’s grief. I need to do something. I can’t just put this one in the patient place.

And in the meantime, my son and I discussed the art of the withering stare. The one that says, “You, buddy, are a fucking jackass, and everyone in this room sees it.” Baby steps, I guess, in the Stand-up-for-what-you-believe-in classroom ethics lessons.

Note: This is fucking brutal as a parent

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/dad-s-boy-hanged-lashes-bullies-article-1.2749845

Curious what other parents would do in this situation. (My gut: I think I will probably contact the teacher first.)

Posted in Angst, Death, Education, Life, Parenthood, Religion | 1 Comment »

Moonlight Mile: Complete Magic (and Terror)

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2016

There are moments, when you have children, that you want to capture in time like a fossil. You want to be able to pull it out at a moment’s notice, hard and solid, and still exactly like that moment you experienced, suspended in time.

I had one of these moments tonight. I drank wine and played ZZ Tops’ “Tres Hombres” while the kids showered. Rollie went to bed to read the new Harry Potter. Tiller came down to hang out with me. I put on “Sticky Fingers.” We looked at her yearbook from last year. (She’s excited and nervous about fifth grade.) I turned the record over to Side 2. We came to the end of the yearbook, and I lay down on the couch. She lay down on my chest and the dog lay on my feet.

It is hard to explain the stillness of this, of the rise and fall of her breath and how it sounded so very beautiful and calming to me. The way I petted her silken child’s hair, as if it would stay that way forever.

And we listened to all of side two. And as we listened to “Moonlight Mile,” we were silent and tears rolled down my cheeks. The moment was perfect and completely unrepeatable. She will never, ever, be ten again, laying on my chest listening to the Stones, and who knows where I will be a year from now.

It was complete magic. And the most terrifying thing I’ve felt in a long while.

Posted in Angst, Beauty, Brody, Family, Home, Life, Memories, Mushy, Parenthood, Tiller | 2 Comments »

Dogwood Girl

Archive for the ‘Angst’ Category

I Knew They Would Break My Heart

Of Tears, Trains, and the Spirit of the Radio

Of Tears, Trains, and the Spirit of the Radio

Empty House, Full of Prophetic Dreams

Living in the Middle Place

Pride, Humility, Change, Gratitude, Acceptance, Truth

*Bold, because if he reads this, I want him to see that I was immensely proud of him today, and that he inspired this post, and that I want him to always follow his truth.

Not Truly Broken

Almost Thirteen: Caught Between What’s Right & Your Kid Not Hating You

Moonlight Mile: Complete Magic (and Terror)

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