The Wink

My memory is shaky on things like birthdays and holidays. They almost always seem to sneak up on me in some way that requires me to feign awareness—”Oh, of course I have green things for each girl to wear and little leprechaun top hats,” and “Oh, sure, big doin’s for the holiday weekend. Been planning for months.” I have the best intentions, but the dealine to sign up for things and the second Monday of each month just seem to slip through my fingers. I’ve read beautiful posts by people who would appear to have their acts together—birthday posts right on their children’s birthdays, essays on topical subjects before they cease to be topical. I’ve passed storefronts beautifully decorated to perfectly celebrate the season, when I look down at my feet they seem to be ever so slightly out of kilter with the weather.

Never quite in step.

Last night, after a flurry of cookie baking so that Avery would have cookies to take to school today, her 6th birthday, I was heading up to bed. I walked quietly upstairs with no intention other than to kiss the brow of each daughter. Ave’s room is at the top of the stairs, so I slipped in there first. I scanned the bed for her form, lately she has been a dark-tressed tangle of limbs and eyelashes. That coltish thing that happens in the instant you realize that the little girl fullness has somehow melted away is everywhere. Her eyes have come to the fore and whether they are filling with tears, flashing with anger, or sparkling with laughter, they bore into me.

I perched on the side of her bed looking at the way her dark lashes curl away from her ivory skin. The unexpected enormity of this next birthday hit me. Six. She is reading without a hitch, throwing a softball, and pulling the garbage cans up our long driveway. She is pushing back and demanding her way, all the while demonstrating an extraordinary capacity to empathize. Then there are the quirks—she wears her headbands in a way that pushes her hair up in huge bubble, no matter how I adjust it, back it goes. I used to twitch, until it settled over me that it simply feels right to her. Her favorite pair of shoes are dark brown, faux leather, fleece lined boots with gold laces and zippers up the back. They are, in a word, hideous. She picked them out herself and has literally worn them into the ground. When I pick her up at school I watch the feet, so many little feet, saltwater sandals, patent leather wedges, neon Mary Janes, pink tennis shoes, she parts the predictable sea with her scuffed, misshapen brown boots. I crack up every time.

Today, likely sporting her boots, she’ll take a basket of blue and yellow sprinkle covered moustache cookies into school. Tonight we’ll celebrate her birthday in a restaurant/brewery. Rather than a traditional party, the five of us will play hookey on Thursday in order to go and see a matinee of the theatrical production of Beaty & the Beast at Proctors Theatre. There is a part of me feeling guilty that she won’t have the traditional party at the germ-ridden, but beloved-by-children place that so many classmates hold their parties. I suspect that in the birthdays to come, we’ll move closer to what the other kids do, but on this birthday, with her quirky brown boots still her shoe of choice in 80 degree weather, I am grateful for what we have.

Still cuddly.

Undeniably herself.

Gently rebellious.

Eminently capable.

Happy birthday VaVa.

This Mother’s Day, if I could make one request, it would be this: one of my childhood friends, a girl who peppers most of the happiest memories of my youth, needs something, I’d like to help deliver it to her.

We fell out of touch as people do, and then reconnected through Facebook. I’ve often chuckled at her pictures, her three rough and tumble boys a stark contrast against my three squealing, boa-loving girls. She in Oklahoma, me in Upstate NY, both so very far from Eugene, Oregon.

During movie time in school we used to take her Swatch watch and take turns running it up and down one another’s forearm to pass the time. The watch smelled funny, rubbery and sweaty, and the motion tickled. We’d play together, all knees and elbows. She became a serious distance runner, I ran hurdles. We drifted apart, but I think we always kept a little seedling of our friendship going. At least I did. Finding her again was the tenderest of gifts.

Not long ago it became clear that something serious was amiss with her youngest boy, Ransom. His eyes are so big, and while his face is not a carbon copy of hers, the wide open kindness that I remember of Aimee leaps from the screen each time I see him. I reel from the awesome reality that she has children, that she made more Aimees, boy versions though they may be. I don’t anticipate any trips to Oklahoma and I am not on the reunion lists for the Eugene schools after having moved in 8th grade. So we have Facebook.

The other day she posted this on Facebook:

A Request for Prayer

Many of our friends have very graciously been praying for and thinking about Ransom throughout these last several months. A big thank you to all of you!

This SUNDAY (MAY 13) we would like to ask anyone who can to pray a Novena for Ransom’s healing. For anyone unfamiliar with a Novena, it is simply a prayer that is prayed for 9 consecutive days. We are asking those participating to pray through Psalm 20 and ask for Ransom’s healing. If there is anyone that you know that might be willing to participate we welcome any and all prayers.

I will post more later, I just wanted to give anyone interested a heads up. Thanks so much.

PS He’s still in the hospital and will probably be there at least through the weekend. His levels are very low (nearing zero) and so it’s hard for his body to fight infection. Hopefully they will start going up tomorrow.

Her son Ransom is in the OU Children’s Hospital and has been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer for someone his age. He has two older brothers and a face that will make you melt. I can’t quite wrap my mind around how he is just that kid your eyes would follow on the playground—the eyes a little twinklier, the smile a little wider, all in all irresistible in a way that just makes you feel happier. Aimee was like that, maybe a little more timid. Maybe he is too.

Aimee lost her dad last October and has shown incredible grace throughout what has to have been the hardest season of her life. Today she posted this:

“A fort/tent for his hospital bed. (His cousin Alex helped build it.)”

She has used words like neutropenia and she has talked about the second round of chemo being harder than the first. I get overwhelmed by the details and the gravity of it all, but when she made her request I thought I had finally found something to latch on to. A way through, or at least to—a way to send her love, energy and the swelling of support I know lives in this blogging community. I am writing to ask you to help Aimee and Ransom and the rest of their family.

I believe I have eliminated all the hurdles of commenting. No need for a blog. No need for an email adress. No need for a real name. I am just asking that you leave words of encouragement, however they come to you, that I can direct her to. Maybe it can diffuse some tiny measure of her anguish and give Ransom a little boost.

It is, as a mom, my only wish.

I thank you from the very bottom of my heart.

We were standing in the kitchen with the girls running laps and shrieking at the top of their lungs, the dog in hot pursuit, when I realized that if dinner wasn’t done in 30 minutes, the catastrophic domino effect would begin—bedtime would be so late that it would box out story time, which would squelch the chance of making lunches ahead of time unless I pushed my own bedtime later. Then just as I burned my hand on the edge of the burner another request came in. I couldn’t understand it so much as I felt it pelting against me as she repeated it. It was with a strident note in my voice that I spat that I had to make dinner.

Murphy’s Law Parental edition states that it is in this moment, that someone gets thirsty, someone gets hurt, someone has to pee and “THERE’S NO TOILET PAPER!” and the dog grabs a precious something or other and trots past the bathroom smugly as a dripping heiny fidgets indignantly. Nothing you can do about it.

I tried to bite back the tears until after bedtime.

Sean said to Avery, “Honey, go grab your tap shoes.”

She looked at him quizzically, “Tap shoes?”

He smiled, “Yes, tap shoes, so you can tap on mommy’s last nerve.” I didn’t think I was wearing it quite so plainly, I felt immediately and entirely naked.

Did what he said to Avery hurt her? Did she think I was mad? How would I fix it? I looked toward her with physical pain.

She was laughing. She literally skipped off giggling, “Tap shoes,” snort, “Daddy!” I shook my head and dropped the panic and overwhelming sense of failure. Of course, any parent worth their salt knows that on a night like this, with dinner yet to be made and kids already fussing, the cloak comes back like a face-diving black fly. After dinner, Sean headed back into work and I began bath time. It was complicated, Finley wanted alone time in the bath, Avery wanted a shower and Briar wanted to not be alone. We worked it out, but it involved 7 or 8 trips up and down the stairs, a complete soaking of my pants and resigning myself to the fact that no one would be in bed before 9pm. Resentment and failure swirled, I tried to keep it out of my voice.

I tucked each girl in, performing the distinct ministrations required by each to sleep, and immediately upon reaching the foot of the stairs, fielded the first of many requests for “just one more thing.” Eventually they tired and drifted off to sleep. I tidied up the kitchen, contemplated dealing with the lunches or folding the laundry or finishing the writing projects I had. I did none of them. I sat for a long while just listening to the wind.

I replayed moments in the day and tallied the things I accomplished and the things that I hadn’t. I waited for the sediment of the day to stop feeling like a massive rock in my gut, I leaned back into the couch. I heard a cry. I waited, when another came I dashed upstairs. Finley was the foot of her bed, crouched and confused, her tear stained face locked on my own. “Are you ok, honey? What happened?” I climbed into her bed and took her in my arms.

She was inconsolable and completely disoriented. I shushed and murmured with my lips pressed against the skin beside her ear. Her body started to relax and we burrowed into the covers and each other. My eyes were scratchy and my body was completely ready for the day to end. She stirred and I pressed my cheek against the crown of her head. Her hair was a soft tangle of still-damp, lavender scented ringlets. I cuddled up against my last baby, the vestiges of a bath done exactly as she’d hoped and a nightmare removed, and the quiet of her sisters sleeping. It might have been with whisper thin margins, but there in the soft glow of the nightlight, I held a shimmering wisp of that elusive finish line.

Slowly but surely I am accepting that I cannot be the architect of my girls’ childhood—I can participate, do what I can to guide them, but they’ll draw their own conclusions, find their own joy and build their own memories. What I can do is give them an incredible backdrop and template for believing in using your strength, smarts and imagination to do whatever you want. It was for all these reasons that last summer we built the girls a club house.

We picked a site.

We drew up some plans.

We purchased supplies.

We built into the space. Literally.

Finley kept the wood hydrated.

We got sentimental as we planned to use a window from our first house.

It began to take shape.

Briar took a test run.

The girls helped.

I helped too.

Helping can be fun.

I kept Sean slightly annoyed.

It began to rain. It rained a lot.

The sun came back. It was perfect in every way.

The surroundings were spectacular.

The window and clear roof came together.

The girls and Beso gave it a thorough inspection.

They decorated.

When fall came it got the full house test with the neighbor kids.

All winter long we worshipped it from across the yard.

I cannot wait to see where their imaginations take them this summer—inside, outside and all around their parent-built club house.