the art of jumping

i used to be scared of heights. i barely remember it now, being the kid who spent all her time in the tops of pine trees getting sap stuck in her hair and on her hand-me-down jeans. we moved south when i was twelve and the trees changed. something happened. i fell out of an old magnolia tree and landed flat on my back. it must have left a crack in me where the fear seeped in.

sixteen years ago i stood ontop of a 150 foot arch overlooking the atlantic ocean. the people and tiny cars with virginia plates kept on motoring by me never once glancing up. life is always in a state of motion that way. even when major life changing events are happening just above your head.

the wind whipped my ponytail in rebellion. flaunting its power, humbling me. i couldn’t believe how far i could see, how clear it all was from up there. i could see the coast of north carolina.

i wanted him to just drop me. or rather, i wanted to close my eyes and have him push me. this was not so much a choice for me, this jump was a present from my older brothers. a way to get over my fears. happy high school graduation, you get to jump first, baby sister.

we rode the ricketty cage elevator up together, he the summer employee with no name or face. me, the stomach full of nerves after signing my weight and life away on a two page waiver. i was strapped to a harness by the ankles and carried a very large padded spring. we got to the top of the arch, the very center of it, and he held me by the back of my beltloops. i leaned out real far and wondered if i was really going to do this. my brothers were waiting 150 feet below me. i had handed them my camera, the one i used to photograph their skydiving jumps and parachute landings. the camera that always kept me grounded for reason on earth.

i wanted him to push me. this guy i didn’t know. i wanted it to be a surprise, something someone did to me…so i could have someone to blame. this is my game, my lesson. i wasn’t ready for this to be that something, a choice i made for myself. something i actually did to myself, for myself.

he must have sensed this and let go of my beltloops. “i’m not going to drop you. you’ve gotta jump on your own.” we were up there awhile with my toes to the edge of the highest high dive i ever looked down from, leading into nothing but air with a cord that could hold the weight of my eighteen year old body.

this was the jump that took my breath, that made me smile with wind dried teeth. this was the time in my life when i screamed and no noise came out. it came as a surprise, my lack of voice. just like in my dreams. but this was real.

jump.
free fall.
bounce.
empowerment.

life goes on repeat. just like each bounce until i hung suspended by my ankles upside down over the ocean. i caught my breath and only after it was over could i enjoy the freefall and what it meant for me personally.

for me life is always cyclical events in a constant state of repeat. this is the nauseating churn in my gut that i am making decisions either based out of fear or in believe of something much much bigger that conquers fear with hope.

if i stop to think of logic i freeze with my toes on the edge. i stagnate out of fear even when i know it’s no way to be true to myself. i stagnate out of fear and it eats me alive. i’ve learned that if i listen to my heart i can hear it beating out belief and trust. it’s in that instant that i jump. quick. without thought. if i’ve learned anything over the past four years it’s to listen to my heart. it keeps me true.

it never gets easier though, this jumping.
it just gets bigger.

water lily

This morning the water lilies are no less lovely, I think, than the lilies of Monet.
And I do not want anymore to be useful, to be docile, to lead children out of the fields into the text of civility, to teach them that they are (they are not) better than the grass.

~ Mary Oliver

low tide

right now i want to run and get lost on the coast of maine. belittled by mother nature. belittled by beauty and sheer size, not by words and behavior.

right now i want to get lost in the low tide. in the forever expanse that stretches out beyond my imagination.

right now would make it all better. there’d be no death and taxes. there’d be no personality clashes, no wrong words. there’d be wind and weather and the vision of forever. there’d be everything in its right place.

but instead it’s hot like heat stroke. instead it’s parched lips and racing hearts and hot tears. instead there is death and funerals. there is tax and timeclocks and explanations and worries and concerns and words and words and words and transmissions in need of repair. 

instead, i am 477 feet above sea level. a fish out of water. drowning on air. convincing myself that i am grounded when in fact my insides are flopping and gulping at something that is not here. convincing myself i’m home when in fact i have never lived so far from the coast.

somewhere deep down there is a whisper and an image of figures walking on the beach at low tide. somewhere deep down there’s an ache and a longing for something i haven’t found yet. but it’s out there calling me to it. wanting me to follow my heart as it leaves footprints in the sand at low tide.

thoughts through the windshield

the sky is white. flat white like a bad paint job in a rundown apartment that proves difficult to clean. the weather is wanting to cry, and it does every so often. little wet tears that spray and mist followed by loud sobs of thunder.

i’m watching through the windshield as it fills with specks of rain, taking my lunch break in the car. watching the park through the windows because i don’t feel much like moving. and i very much feel like just sitting still. listening to nothing and no one.

i’m in a place of non-action lately. it’s a place that has taken quite some time to get to. although it’s unfamiliar, it’s comfortable. this state of non-doing… non-reacting. for once i think i am the rock. i am no longer the water that rushes endlessly flowing flowing flowing. i am the rock who sits. who does not fight. i have no battle worth my time or energy.

i no longer care what is wrong and what is right. justice lives within the universe of my mind. it’s a math equation. it’s fractal time spiralling and quickening as we  pace ourselves into our future.

i dont’ need to shout it anymore. and so i’ve found i dont’ have much to say. i’m just sitting instead of racing like rapids, fighting and trying to control the uncontrollable. i am sitting. i know now that none of it matters. all that matters is that river is loved and  safe. and i know both of these things are true. i cannot control emotions or experiences when he is not in my arms. i cannot hold back the nightmares or the heartbreak of wants that go unmet. i cannot lift the disappointment that weighs down. as much as i want to, i am just not that powerful. i’m learning that disappointment is very heavy. it was one thing to feel it in my own hands but it’s another thing to see it in a child’s heart. he’s too young. too young at age four to learn what i learned at age 33.

i tried. i tried to control the rain and the mud. i tried to beat it into submission. to do what is right. but mud is mud. it’s gonna stick to you whether you want it to or not.

for a long time i rushed around and then one day about a month ago i tried to take a deep breath. and my heart hurt. like a balloon that was too tight, i felt like it would pop. and in that moment i realized that nothing really matters.

the mud, the rain, the wind and heat will all do whatever they want. you can scream into the wind, but you’ll get nothing in return but a sore throat.

i realized this place of non-action when i felt my heart. and a bit of anxiety whispered to me, it won’t matter one bit if you end up dead from a hard attack.

‘let it go.’ my heart whispered through tight lips.
so i did.

and i would have missed it today, had i been rushing about in the weather. i would have missed the bike coming from around the corner. and all the skin as he rode past me in the rain, riding a beach cruiser through the park in a thong.

i smiled through the rain, through the windshield and realized that nothing really matters but your heart.

laughing in the wind

we cruise together like this, you and me. we are only new in this way of time passing, days growing longer, feet reaching the pedals, wind in our faces. we needed this. this today of memories. this today of thoughts to be pulled from your mind with the wind in your lungs.

this is you and me. this is the image and memory i want to engrave in your mind. our good times, real moments occur around us all the time. i sense them near and i want to reach out and hold them forever. we are beautiful, you and me. like today, our first bike ride this way. you are so grown here in this photo, this day of firsts. i see so much for us. i hold it all in my heart and with strong hands holding tight we make our way up and down the hills. the excitement of the breeze and the speed of free fall then the soreness of the strength needed to climb up the hills.

we were laughing so much today. you and me. laughing in the wind down big big hills. we were all picnics. snowcones. bike ride enjoyment. mother and child. two people enjoying one another’s presence.

we were laughing so much that i forgot all about the fixation on death you have these days. how true sadness pours from the corners of your eyes and catches in your throat when you think of death. “i don’t want to die, liam will miss me!” the words i speak to comfort you. your dreams leave me speechless and wanting more. “momma how did i dream i wanted one last hug and kiss before you died?”

all this death talk ages me not just in your dreams. “i was old right? i had white hair?” i ask to which you say defiantly, “i won’t tell you.” all through the eyes of a serious soul, with just a hidden smile, a boy in a tree, a hug around my knee.

you are growing and absorbing the big wide world around you. it is beautiful. it is scary. it is unkind words, it is hurt feelings, it is disappointments, it is skinned knees and melancholy souls. it is all things i’d protect you from but cannot. life is simply being human and feeling it all. and you do.

“i want you to stay new.” you tell me surrounded by water and boats that float in the tub as night falls. i didn’t understand. “i want you to stay new like you are now.”

new.

that i am. and so are you.

together, i think we’ll stay this way for a long long time. it’s most certainly a good place to be. where you’ll always be my little boy riding behind me catching my laughter as it rides on the wind.

half empty ~ half full

i am three today. i am not a label, i am not anything but a small soul with sad eyes. i am your motherless child.

i would throw my pillow and blankets with force. hurling them across the room at someone, anyone. i would resist your empathy and you would somehow understand my anger. i would sit with it just awhile before the simple need of comfort would overcome any resistance i harbored, any stubbornness i feigned.

i would welcome your arms as you scooped me, all jelly bones onto your hip. i would scream and cry with no regard for darkness or quiet or others nearby. “come” you would whisper, “come, collapse in my arms. it’ll be ok.” you would understand. i would feel it through your hands that hold me. i know you. you feared your motherless child. you feared that loss that came so close after birth. i am hard on your heart to see. but you continue to look. and you really see me.

over your shoulder my tears would fall, leaving wet shiny circles on the hardwood floor five feet below us. you would feel a thousand miles away because you are. and yet you would be here with strength and balance to hold me, understanding the tears i cry for all sadness everywhere. these are the simple things that can be made smooth for one who is three.

a voice over the phone that sits alone waiting for it all to begin.  today.  if i were closer we would sit together in our shared silence and know things unspoken. but today i am in my car eating lunch and you are staring at your hands. the hands that crown you ‘father’.

the static of the phone forces a distance between us.  two pisces swimming in uncharted waters. i wonder if you are scared.  i know i would be.  everyday from now until june 8th you will come to this place.  this hospital.  the very place you loathe will be the place to save you.

the same eyes, the same faces will greet you with smiles and positivity. day in and day out. 42 sessions. you will come to know them, their stories, just as they will come to know you.  you as you were. you as you are now becoming radioactive ~ in hopes to kill the cancer within.

today i can’t tell if the glass is half empty or half full.
it is simply holding water.

slipping through

what intrigues me is how quickly i re-route my brain. like traffic detoured, the thoughts quickly turn elsewhere. there is guilt, because i am just that kind of person. not even raised catholic, i’m carrying the guilt of every choice and life it changes. but there is no regret. what intrigues me is the foundation of human spirit, of what drives us to walk away and turn our back. human spirit causes us to reflect and think and feel more alive everyday. whether dark or light. spirit is a thing of beauty.

what i miss when i’m not looking is the world unravelling. a magnificient disaster, a beautiful chaos. when i’m not looking, i’m seeing but not being aware. and it all slides past me, through my fingers like something wet and slippery.

i don’t photograph my son at school. i tried at first because that is what came naturally for me. but try as i might, i just could not see him. he was right infront of me and yet not really there.

this bothered me at first, the first couple months. and then one day i realized what it was when i was talking with a friend. it’s a push pull, a yanking of the rope as he ventures further into the cave he’s exploring. he’s learning who he is, his social self. through the camera it appears to be a bit like making faces in the mirror when you think no one is looking.

it’s hard sometimes to see this awkwardness in him. the discomfort on being put on this planet, dropped down into it like a bomb from the sky, not asking for the experience even though his spirit signed this contract before his birth. it’s only awkward in the sense that i remember it so well. it’s only awkward because i know him and his story more than i know anyone else on this planet. it’s only awkward because it’s life and awkward is beauty, awkward breaks out of the box.

growth is painful, for him and me both. seeing him grow into this being, this four year old… watching him navigate his way… i’m lucky to witness it during our days at school and yet sometimes i wonder if it makes it harder on my heart, heavier on my guilt because it’s a child i cannot disassociate from. he will forever be mine in that regard, perpetually reflecting and shouting our story aloud for strangers to hear.

when my mom went back to work, i was four as well. it was the year and half before kindergarten. she and i were in the same nursery school (they were nursery schools back then and ours adjoined the church. a thick brick wall divided our playscape and swingset from the convent and nunnery) she eased back into her teaching so our schedules would be compatible.

there are worlds of similiarities and worlds of difference between our stories.

but these days, aside from strong memories that stand out like show and tell nerves and the quiet voice raising heat to crimson in my cheeks, i am seeing and feeling it as she must have thirty years ago when she was not just mom but also teacher.

i’m sure my mother saw this in me, the learning of myself. i wonder if i was all those things to her, all the things she wished she could change about herself, all those things spied under the microscope that becomes childhood parenthood motherhood. because i’ve never experienced anything more probing than motherhood.

these children of ours (mine and who i was at age four) we are learning of ourselves in a social setting. moreso than just family life or what is socially acceptable behavior. but simply learning how to be heard in a group of children when temperaments and pecking order dictate the group in reflection of society’s own social status. i wonder if seeing me in this light, as i see my own son, changed just a little perspective for her as it does for me.