to my neighbor
July 28, 2015 § 8 Comments
I was watching you today, in the time between our polite waves and small talk; the way you leaned into your phone like the weight of worries and tired limbs could find peace in the voice at the other end of your call. I know something of your days, there isn’t enough room between our homes for me to feign ignorance. Our community is so small that it is unavoidable we share one another’s imperfect experiences.
Just yesterday another mother confided one of your children had struggled a bit that morning at camp. I imaged your son pushing against the rules, restless and challenging. I know the size of the smile that comes when he settles into familiar boundaries in the same way I know the volume at which he fights discontent.
I don’t have any words of wisdom, but today I had this thought: I hope that you find more voices of comfort. Raising children is hard work, something that brings us both a sense of purpose and the risk of judgement. Too many times we assume knowledge of others’ lives and we miss an opportunity to exercise compassion in place of criticism.
I’ve seen you correct your children and hold them; I see your love and I want you to know that I do not measure your mistakes. I hope our home’s new owners will see the same and, perhaps, offer you greater friendship than we found between our front doors. That you may gain a new place to lean.
to my mother-in-law
July 28, 2015 § 2 Comments
There was a time your unkind messages would break my spirit and twist my thoughts into acts of defensiveness and guarded injury. I would speak your harm in confidence to those I trusted with my feelings to illuminate untruths and fortify my spirit with the love you did not have to give.
It was important, then, that others understand my experience. Over the past year it has become more important that your words do not define my identity as your daughter-in-law. I want my love for my family, your son and grandchildren, to be larger than your illness and so I no longer speak your unkindness as evidence of our wellness.
I will not share your messages in writing or speech, they are irrelevant to my truth. To share them would be to harm you and I fear you are wounded enough.
Instead, I wish you well; that you will find peace and heal. That there is time enough in your life to become the person you might have been and not the unhappy reflection of so much discontent.
Marie
making happiness
July 26, 2015 § 2 Comments
Tonight my daughter mused that the work her father has been gifting our house isn’t for our happiness, it is for the New People. We, she stated emphatically, will have to make our happiness somewhere else.
There hasn’t been a day since we first shared our news that our children haven’t sounded out questions and hopes in overlapping thoughts. We talk about the unknown New People, joking at our happiness for their good fortune as my husband finishes old projects. Tonight I was marveling at beautiful pieces of a home that is almost no longer ours. This is how my daughter came to announce that we will just have to go to our new house and make our own happiness for ourselves.
Her confidence and cheer were as pronounced as her dimples; I wanted to capture her effervescence like bubbles mid-flight that we might marvel together over the luminous wisdom of her simple certainty. We will make our happiness into our home.
I wish her words were a wand, or at the very least an enchantment, that I might ward off sadness or fear to better guard her joy. I am certain there will be emotional days to come, but tonight it is enough to capture the shape of her hope.
old lessons & new opportunities
July 26, 2015 § 7 Comments
I moved quite a bit as a child. The predictability of this change invited a comfortable disconnect; an uninvested curiosity that lead me to find quiet periphery spaces from which to people watch. It was a skill that often helped me disappear from the discomfort of new experiences as easily as uncomfortable mistakes.
It is a fallacy that we can reinvent ourselves; the truth is, we never really begin from somewhere new. Our past is a private weight we carry into each beginning; old lessons that we can either stubbornly ignore or patiently explore.
I’ve been reflecting on this awareness recently, more tender to my mistakes as I lean into the change of our impending move and a milestone birthday. Soon to turn 40, I feel as if I am overdue to grow into a more sage maturity, a calmer confidence. Steeped in sentiment, I have been considering old lessons learned in complicated messes of imperfect relationships. The first is one of forgiveness.
My greatest friendships are those I walked beside another in moments of disagreement or misunderstanding. These relationships are fortified in vulnerability and accountability; a willingness to not simply forgive another an unkind thought, but myself and imperfect kindness. It requires seeing another’s perspective and accepting a difference of opinion without tally or judgement.
Authenticity in self was a more complicated lesson, one that fought against old habits of disappearing acts. I have learned to be more genuine in my expression of self, to stand more comfortably in my preferences while also pushing tenderly against insecurities to accommodate new experiences. On the few occasions I have found myself moving hollowly through he motions of either avoidance or false acquiescence, I have compromised the integrity of other’s expectations until excuses create fissures to trust.
These are the relationships I actively avoid at the cost of insincerity, a forced politeness and passive unhappiness. I learned, too late, the value of sincerity to mutual respect; to hesitate in my trust and speak directly least I rush to please without first establishing a foundation of security. The rare relationships that began too quickly from a willingness to sacrifice self for the sense of another’s happiness have failed to thrive. These are the friendships that might have sustained unforeseen differences had we not inferred a greater importance to superficial similarities.
It is enough to appreciate another’s place in our lives, to share a space in theirs, without folding ourselves into a false expectation of friendship. I learned I will not friend and unfriend in accordance with school yard pettiness for the sake of a privileged place in another’s preference. There is no place in motherhood for outdated vanities of distorted loyalty. My friends are scattered far in both space and time; rarely do they intersect in company. For this reason, I have found myself among a spectrum of clever and creative individuals who do not exclude others for the sake of inclusion.
Over the past ten years I have grown into lessons I want to carry as consciously as the meticulously labeled boxes stacked neatly in preparation for our move, remembering sharp edges of uncomfortable errors with a gentler intention; to choose patience and authenticity, kindness and integrity. I want to nurture new relationships that value tolerance and offer forgiveness, that encourage individuality and invite sincerity.
years in miles
July 25, 2015 § 2 Comments
I could measure my oldest friendship in miles. The long stretches of main street on a small town summer night; country roads that wound their way between our families’ homes; highways that highlight lost years after high school graduation; neighboring suburban sidewalks where we reconnected in motherhood, stealing school day mornings to fall into the familiar comfort of easy conversation and companionable silence.
She’s the person I couldn’t wait to tell my news and the one I cannot imagine leaving. Our monthly breakfasts are food for my soul, my own fountain of youth even as we near a shared milestone birthday. She’s the person who never asked the difficult questions and knows all the complicated truths; the quiet place I rest my worries and buoy myself in moments of doubt.
There are too many miles between our years to doubt the steadfast certainty of our friendship, but today I am sad for the measure of time between miles that mark a new stretch of space between us.
signs
July 22, 2015 § Leave a comment
While it is no secret, here, that our family is moving, the decision has been a private knowledge in our daily lives. Slowly and intentionally, with an emphasis on more intimate sharing, we have begun telling our friends the news. It is a slow process, one we have not hurried for the emotions of each telling. The rush of nerves and anxious excitement, we swing high with our joy and low with inevitable loss.
The balance of our emotions is a happy anticipation, but the broad sweeping arcs of enthusiasm and sentiment pull at our energy. It was our daughter who recognized the physical and emotional exhaustion in this process and created a simpler expectation of one telling per day. At this rate, it was unavoidable that the news might announce itself.
Monday a sign appeared in our yard. It was anticipated and still unexpected; a premature proclamation that quickly interrupted our intentions with a louder presence. In some ways, it made room for necessary telling; creating space for conversations we couldn’t seem to begin. In other ways, the abrasive and impersonal interruption to the landscape of our silence was overwhelming for those we would have preferred a gentler introduction to our announcement.
Either way, it has become official. The rhythm of our telling has changed, but our joy is a little less obscured in the open.
subtext
July 21, 2015 § 2 Comments
My diary of our most recent decision to move is, on the surface, no more than a series of journal entries on our daily progress; the emotions and choices that mark this milestone. Underneath the unexceptional is an extraordinary experience; a subtext that informs a greater appreciation for the accidents of fate that gift us remarkable opportunities to be present in moments of distraction.
Each day there has been a happy surprise. I’ve noted the generosity of so many kind souls, but today I am thinking of the serendipitous alignment of strangers.
Last night things slowly started to derail. The lengthy list of last-minute projects wasn’t progressing in accordance with the hour and our paint supplies were running bare. It was bad luck at the worst time, but something manageable that could be addressed with a specific effort and so I ran to the hardware store moments before it closed.
It was this task that aligned my path with summer friends from a time long passed, late afternoons at the neighborhood park district pool when the crowds had dispersed and the water had turned cool. They were a memory of a year made permanent in a single photograph, but strangers to the season of different schools.
Yesterday, scanning unfamiliar aisles for my husband’s last-minute request, I was thinking only of what must be done when I saw a face more familiar for the heat of the day and the time of the year. Our summer friends. We gathered casually, disrupting the traffic of hurried shoppers and remembered out loud what we had forgotten while filling in the gaps between our last hello.
I told them about our impending move and they told me about their daughter’s illness, everything and nothing in between. It was as if we had never lost the time between pool days, the ease of old conversations and shared smiles. But everything is different. Their little girl is ill and I cannot dwell on the inconvenience of an impractical timeline for house projects.
Coming home from the store it was clear there was nothing my last-minute errand would fix; our house could not ready herself in time for this day.
Today is a new day and this summer is greater than one decision, it is a season of friendship and chance that invites a greater appreciation for stolen moments and borrowed perspectives. It is a day to rest, replenish, and redirect.
almost & never
July 20, 2015 § Leave a comment
This weekend has been a race between almost and never; a contest of wills as we tackle last minute projects with frenzied attentiveness despite sleepy heads and heavy limbs. Every effort is informed by a fierce optimism, every uncertainty tempered by evidence of our ability. We’ve made remarkable progress and we’re near the end of our preparations, but these last 24 hours will not wait on our readiness.
New stairs and finished doors, tidy trim and patched paint, boxes stored and shelves emptied. We’ve uncovered wood floors and borrowed art, shuffled furniture and scavenged treasures for elements of interest. We’ve taken the shape of a home that fit our comforts and created room for someone else’s hopes with old-fashioned hard work.
In a month we will not remember the sore muscles and cluttered counter tops, the grit of our floor between projects and the smell of fresh paint, but we will not soon forget the community of kindness that made the impossible attainable these past two days. Friends who distracted our daughter with time away from home; others who supplied meals while we were too busy to plan and too hurried to cook; another, still, who sacrificed family time to set the stage for our sale.
We’re almost finished, but we could never have done this alone. Thank you.
to my husband
July 17, 2015 § Leave a comment
We’re somewhere in the middle of two different places. On one hand, we’ve almost finished our house projects and packed up the past. At the same time, we’ve made new commitments that have only just begun. There isn’t even time to fully absorb the reality of the work that remains despite all the effort we’ve already exerted.
Last night you unpacked a closet and I marveled at the river of items that interrupted my sense of completion. I wanted you to push everything out of sight, to pretend for a moment that we were further along in our progress. Then, today, came a new mess; a singular project that multiplied into many as dust clouded over boxes still unsealed, countertops cluttered with tools, and previously clean corners behind partially open doorways.
This is life. The vastness of what we cannot control and the clarity of acceptance when we realize we can only choose our response. We will clean and reclean the evidence of this moment, forgetting the inconvenience and discomfort. For today I want to remember the quiet beneath the chaos, when we chose not to allow the threat of destruction to override our kindness to one another.
The messy in-between is more than the physical fall out of hurried projects and limited time, it is the emotional space of so many life experiences. We’ve been here before for the premature birth of our son, the preterm labor of our daughter, special needs diagnoses and an emotionally abusive relative, but it exists in even the most mundane experiences of marriage and home making. With each unforseen challenge we’ve had to link hands and choose our path around new obstacles with old commitments.
We can pack our lives into marked boxes and clean away the dust, but the messiness of life cannot be so neatly contained. It’s been a long year, one we’ve weathered privately to guard our children against harm. In silence we lost the comfort of friends, but we mapped out a space of integrity.
We’re still in-between heartache and hope, there’s much left to do and more we cannot control. Maybe one day we’ll tell the story of this past year, but for now it is enough to start again together.
Love you.
to my son
July 17, 2015 § 2 Comments
Sometimes I forget to call out a thank you when things are easy; to remember to praise with the same ease I might complain. We’re all a little tired, emotional, distracted by what needs to be done.
Thank you for helping with every impulsive directive. There hasn’t been a task you didn’t tackle or a request you second guessed.
We haven’t had a pool day yet and your friends are largely occupied with other commitments. It isn’t the summer we imagined on those last early morning school days, but we’re close to a few well-deserved frivolous days.
It’s the final push before our home goes on the market, the next few days are full of last-minute projects and cleaning. Paperwork and planning.
Yesterday your father and I were in your room, shuffling furniture out of the way to patch and paint when I closed the door to vacuum. In neatly arranged letters taped to the back of your door were the words: You’re Special.
When I asked you about the sign, you said that there was a time when everyone seemed mad and you were pretty down. So, you made a sign with what you had.
You are awesome. I wish as a teenager I had the same fortitude to tackle hurt feelings with confidence. To create a message of strength and guard my self-worth.
It’s funny the things we find when we aren’t looking. I was worried about you loosing your summer and instead I found a lesson in resilience.
Love, Mom
