Hoo-kay. I’m tired. Don’t usually set an alarm, but after last night I had to. Might have slept til noon. After all that volume and drama, and another two hours of post-blog entry, late night nonsense from Elihu, wouldn’t you know, he’s up early. On his own. He beat me. Never happens. I shuffle in to the kitchen to get the morning going, and he’s at the window, watching birds.
“I love you, Mimsy” he says, cheerfully. Is this his way of apologizing? “Man, that was quite a night” I say. “What?” he pauses. “Oh, the fight” he says in a softer tone. He gets off the stool and comes over to me. “You’re the best mother in the world”. ??? Does he feel bad? I’m too tired to explore it. Suffice to say, this morning he is changed in some way. I suggest he get dressed, and brush his teeth. But that’s it. Usually I must ask several times. He goes and does these things and returns. I ask if he would like to let the chickens out, something he’s never done by himself as he’s still afraid of the dark garage (it’s out of visual range of the kitchen door, that might contribute). He agrees, then sets out to get his shoes, jacket and glasses – all without any help. Also new. Then he’s off to the garage. ?? He comes back. He is still cheerful. ??
We’re off to the bus. Reminding myself that this is a first for me, and it will not be the beginning of a trend, I drive him to the bus stop still in my pajamas. The bus comes, and he leans in to kiss me. ??? On his own. Then, again a first (as I will not be seen like this standing on the side of the road) he gets out without my accompanying him, leans in through my open window to give me another kiss, then he is off. He gets in the bus, the driver waves, and morning is done. Wow.
Lest people think that things are all roses and birds here at the Hillhouse, I would like all to know that as I write Elihu is in an absolute frenzy. It is after nine, and it is bedtime. Usually, I’d say 99% of the time these days it’s a smooth affair. But tonight, as he was finishing his bath, I told him – as I do many such nights – that I had to go and shut the chickens in. He wanted to go with me. As it was late, raining and also a school night, I said no. He launched into a tirade. A half an hour later he is still begging me to see the chickens. He yells to me he’s tired, and he’s ready to fall asleep but he ‘needs to see his chickens.’ It goes on, at top volume. Now he’s bargaining with me. He has modified his request to simply see the baby chicks that reside in the basement brooder. I am trying so hard to keep my anger at bay. This is a time when I question my treating him so much as a peer. Maybe I’ve blurred the line. Maybe I’ve put too much on him. Usually he’s very reasonable. Not tonight.
I’m not sure how this will turn out. He’s making threats now. He’ll says he’ll throw something. He says he’ll damage something if I don’t let him see the chicks. I told him no he could not see them, and that he was to stay in bed. I told him that was the last I was saying to him on the subject, and told him good night. I’m tempted to respond to him as his protests mount, but I stay myself. Something inside me tells me to hang on. Be strong. Ride it out. And I remember all the nights when he was a baby, a toddler, an angry, strangely possessed creature. Often he would have nightmares long after I’d pulled him from his crib and brought him into the light and into my arms; he’d be flailing his arms at some imagined monsters while I was talking to him, holding him close. At eight he is still afraid to go to the basement on his own. If he’s outside he needs to call to me if he gets out of visual range. I reflect on this. Is tonight about sheer anger at his world? Fatigue? Hidden anxiety? Is is that I haven’t been firm enough with him? Nurture or nature? I understand that he can’t see me when he’s more than twenty feet away. I understand that it’s still tricky to know he has half siblings that don’t live with us, and that daddy lives with two of them – instead of with us. I understand there’s a lot of emotional chaos under the calm waters. I also know that I’ve always respected his thoughts and desires. I’ve always let him express himself. I’ve listened. Have I given too much? Is this the product of my giving him so much of a say in things? Why is he behaving like this tonight? Maybe it’s just time. We’ve had such smooth sailing, and for so long, that perhaps it’s just due. I don’t know. But thankfully, in the short time it’s taken me to write this little bit, he’s quieted. I’ll wait.
Many minutes later, all is still quiet. I’ll wait until I’m sure. I don’t want to start this all over again by checking on him before he’s out. And he can sometimes take hours to be out. Some nights, when I’m beyond cajoling and prompting I’ll just fall asleep on my bed, waiting for him to finish his bedtime routine. I’ll awake an hour later to find him at his desk, drawing birds. He’ll be happy, relieved to finally see me, and he’ll readily climb into bed with me there to read to him. He is a tough one to figure some days.
He’s out. And my laundry lies in an enormous mound on my bed, just waiting. I too am a little angry I suppose. Nights like this I wonder how different it might be if I had a partner to help bear the burden. I could easily succumb to my own temper right now. I imagine that my laundry would be folded by now if I’d had some help tonight. I wonder if there would even have been an episode at all if we were a family with dad present. But I do realize this is just one night of many. I know that every family has nights like this. I guess I probably have it pretty good for the most part. So for now I’ll pull out a Gilmore Girls DVD, enjoy a moment alone and get this laundry folded and put away.
A friend in Chicago recently told me that there was a Scottish band by the name of Old Blind Dogs heading my way, and that they’d be at Caffe Lena soon. He advised we go, and asked we remember him to the band as the bouzouki player they jammed with in Flossmoor the day Bin Laden got knocked off. Ok, it was an introduction of sorts I suppose. The day had arrived, yet now I was losing my resolve to go. It seemed too expensive for us, plus I was rather pooped from my long day. I asked Elihu how he felt. I cited the pros and cons. I asked him on a 1 to 10 scale how he felt. He said 8. Then we pulled them up on you tube and listened. “Oh yeah, I wanna go” he said. “We gotta go, it’s a 10 now.” “It’s going to cost a lot” I warned, reminding him of our plans to build a new coop. “But I’ll always remember this!” He got me. That’s always been my ultimate gauge for making a decision. He was probably right. So I was off to clean up.
Caffe Lena is a tiny coffee house at the top of a creaky flight of stairs in Saratoga Springs which has been there over 50 years now. As a child I knew Lena, who was old by then, or at least to my young eyes looked as old and whiskered as a witch (I suppose everyone over 40 appeared this way). She was always kind to me when my parents would drop me off to hear a show. She’d wait at the top of the stairs and wave down to my folks, letting them know she’d keep watch over me. There’s a folk-art sort of portrait of Bob Dylan at the top of the stairs done on a piece of plywood, made on the occasion of his appearance there in 1960. The walls of the narrow downstairs hall are covered in ancient handbills of past performances under a thick, shiny lacquer. The bathrooms are tidy and their walls covered with happy graffiti. Elihu himself wrote in red sharpie on the night of his performance there last year. He had drawn a woodpecker climbing up the wall. Beside it he wrote “Elihu’s first open mic – 3/11/10” in a six-year old’s lettering. It was as much a right of passage for me as it was for him.
This time, Elihu counted the stairs as we creaked our way up towards the cozy room. I was ready to pay the steep admission, yet when they saw his size, the woman kindly offered to charge only $5 for his ticket. A nice way to start the night. Also, there were two unreserved seats right next to the drummer’s side of the stage. Wow. We’d gotten there early enough to find good seats, yet these were better than I’d hoped. It wasn’t a big place, yet Elihu can’t see much detail past ten feet, and so a table’s distance away can make a big difference in his experience. We were set!
The group’s bassist had been detained in Minneapolis by customs. I thought it a shame, both for the guy himself, and for the remaining trio. They’d have to fill it all up by themselves. I needn’t have worried. The three musicians created so much sound that the poor fellow was hardly missed. The drummer had a small setup; a large djembe sat before him, a deep snare to his left, then a high hat, a kick drum, another mounted djembe and two cymbals, one with a chain draped over it for sizzle. He also played a small talking drum which he could hold as he played. By mid-set Elihu was just not able to stop playing on the table. Even though our table partners seemed easy-going enough, I was worried that I might be the mom who thinks her kid’s so wonderful that rules don’t apply to him. “How bout just one finger? Like this.” I tapped with my index fingers on the edge of the table. Good solution, for a short while. Their energy was just too all-consuming. (At one point in a moment of inspiration he grabbed my arm and shouted in my ear “Mommy, I’m going to busk and make $25 and I’m going to buy myself a pair of brushes tomorrow!) The scene reminded me of years ago, when I’d go to shows with an egg shaker in my purse because sooner or later the music would become too compelling to resist, and I’d simply have to join in on something. Our neighbors were kind about it, but I was still unsure whether Elihu’s enthusiasm was too much. It was a great set, yet in spite of that Elihu was beginning to feel tired and he asked if we could go soon. I tried to distract him by calling his attention to something in the arrangement so that he’d forget about wanting to go; it was the first time I’d heard live music in such a long time and I wanted to stay. We made it to the end of the set, and the band announced they’d take a couple minutes’ break. Elihu and I made our way out.
The place is small, and the drummer was right there. Elihu stood before him and thanked him. “Do you want to see the drums?” the fellow asked. No doubt he’d noticed Elihu’s interest. The two walked back to his setup and had a little session. The drummer showed him his talking drum, and encouraged Elihu to try. He tried it briefly, but I could tell he was jonesin to get at the monster djembe on stage. “Go on” the man said, smiling kindly. Elihu ran the whole way round the room to get on the stage, and when he got there he sat down and began to play. It was a very loud drum, and he was playing a little rushed and scattered. I leaned in to encourage him. “Just do your groove, honey, you know, your thing“. He took a breath, then began.
Elihu grooved hard. He made a couple intentional false stops. He had the audience. He started up again. Not too long. Just enough. He slammed his hands down together in a final woomp. There. That’s it. The place went up in shouts and applause. During the whole thing I just laughed and laughed. Even though I know what he has, and how he’s gotten better, it felt just wonderful to have a whole room of people share in it together. What a moment. As we were leaving, the drummer gave Elihu a CD. I’d even considered buying one – something I’d seldom do – yet now here was another gift. Amazing. As I chatted my goodbyes to some folks at the ticket table, I noticed Elihu making small talk with the bagpiper – and the two parted laughing like old comrades. We smiled all the way down the stairs and onto the street.
A warm, weekend night in Saratoga is almost always a party. And so it was tonight. Before we’d gone to the show, we’d set an old dinner roll on the sidewalk outside to feed the sparrows with and found it still waiting for us. So we picked it up and headed around the corner into the alley in search of some birds. Hattie’s Chicken Shack was booming. People filled the restaurant. The old screen door creaked open and thwacked closed behind the crowds as they exited. We walked around to the back of the restaurant, hoping to find a late-night sparrow waiting for handouts, but it was too dark, too noisy, too Saratoga. There was a garden in the back of the place that was also full of people. The windows to the kitchen were open and faced the alley. “Look at all those guys workin so hard! They’re still slammed!” I said as I pointed to the chefs bent over stainless tables. One saw us and smiled. “Did you eat here tonight?” he asked. “Naw, a little pricey for us” I answered, smiling back. Truly, these days, it was a different Hattie’s. It wasn’t always so upscale; I could remember many decades ago when Hattie herself stood guard. Her ancient husband, a slight, bald black man was always in attendance, a towel draped over his arm. He was the epitome of gracious service. Many summer nights the restaurant was populated by only a few tables. The chicken was always the most delicious I’d ever had, anywhere. The cook shouted down to us from his window. “Want some chicken? Wait – just wait a second” he ducked back into the kitchen and returned with two drumsticks in his tongs, which he reached out the open window and handed to me. “They’re really hot, watch out”. I thanked him with a huge smile and a look of amazement. As I juggled the hot chicken, Elihu ran into a neighboring bar and came out with a pile of napkins. We made our way across the street to Ben & Jerry’s where they have large, freed-standing swinging seats for their patrons. Although it’s still a ‘new’ place in my mind, I realize that many local kids have grown up knowing this corner as if it’s always been here. My son will too. And so, it has become one of those defining little corners of the town. We sit to eat our chicken. We rock, we take in the perfect air. The sounds of bands come at us from distant bars. Bunches of big kids sit and check their phones. Couples walk by with their dogs. It’s a perfect night in town. We are in no hurry, and I wait for Elihu to have his fill. I don’t want to end tonight by telling him we have to go. We don’t.
But finally, it’s time. We get in the car, roll down the windows and begin to drive through the twinkling streets. We’ve brought along his djembe, and he plays it in the back seat as passersby look for the source of the sound. Soon we’re passing the mansions of North Broadway as we head out for the country roads. We put the CD in. It starts slow. “Where are the quarter notes?” Elihu asks. “There’s really no time yet, you can play what you like”. So he does. A freeform, expressive sort of playing. Then the groove begins. It fades up, and Elihu joins in. We are now winding through the dark on the last road to our house. The road twists and turns, it rises and dips. The music seems to grow with intensity as we come nearer to our home. Then we turn down the long driveway into the woods. When I bring the car to a stop, Elihu leans forward and gradually fades the track down to silence. We notice that Uncle Andrew has closed the chickens in their coop for us while we were out. It’s official, this night was perfect.
Last night, as Elihu and I lay side by side in bed, lights off and awaiting sleep, he said to me “You know why I’m so glad to have you as my mom?”, to which I said nothing, letting a moment pass. “Because every day with you I learn something new”. And shortly thereafter, we were both asleep.
Tonite I’ve just drawn a bath, while he’s gone outside to watch the birds’ final visits to the feeder in the dimming light, a light which finally allows him to watch them without his usual dark red sunglasses, eyes wide open. He called to me, saying he heard a Woodcock in the neighboring field. “Please, Mommy, we have to go see him!” he begged. A bath will always be there. This was an opportunity. We grabbed our flashlights and headed out.
In the distance, the black silhouette of the hills stood out against the last light of day. The sun had been down for a while, yet there was still just enough light to see by. A buzzing sound, more like a lone cricket than a bird, sounded from the middle of the field. It was a short, raspy, buzzing sound that reminded me of a bug lamp zapping out a mosquito. It was intermittent, but his location was unmoving. After several failed attempts to locate the bird we hit upon a good tactic. I would scan the field with my light, eventually seeing the bird’s eyes reflecting back, two shiny retinal mirrors. Surprisingly the bird stood still as we carefully approached. I would get the bird in my spot of light and Elihu, lamp strapped to his forehead, would begin his approach. We made three good tries, the third time, although I was still a good hundred feet away, I was able to see the bird’s form. Elihu crept closer still, and finally, only feet away, he witnessed the bird fly up and away, my spot following the bird in the air as best I could. Impressive. A bird I might well go my whole life through without ever seeing (hell, without Elihu’s knowledge of his call I’d never even know I shared my world with such a creature) had just shifted something inside of me. I could just make out his strangely long bill in the light. His shape was so different, so unlike all the easily-spotted birds that we’ve almost come to take for granted. It was a grand moment. Elihu was elated. He cheered and laughed. We both agreed it was a perfect end to our impromptu mission and we began to walk back to the field’s edge, back to our cozy little house behind the tree-lined stone wall.
“I saw exactly what he looked like and now I can draw him” Elihu said as we neared the house. Clearly, the bath would have to wait a moment longer. Drawing, bath and call to Daddy follow. I am so tired now, I cannot keep my eyes open long enough to read to him from the Burgess Bird Book for Children. Instead, I lay on my side, facing him. His eyes cannot close. He stares at the ceiling. I know he is reliving the moment over and over. I can share it with him no more, and fall asleep.
Today, we’ve both learned something new. Thank you, my dearest Elihu. I’m so glad to have you as my son.
Although the date was different last year, the day was the same; mother’s day, the day when our hummingbirds returned. They arrived again this year only a few hours ago. I had washed out the feeders, mixed a fresh batch of sugar water and hung them outside our kitchen window only minutes before the first male came buzzing in. This is a thrill in our house. “The hummingbirds are back!” I shouted. Elihu began to dance and nearly cried in his joy. He also practically knocked me over to get up on the stool to see for himself. He found it difficult to eat dinner tonight, as preoccupied as he was with the tiny bird. Thankfully, in this final hour before dark the little fellow is making repeat trips to the feeder, and as Elihu chats with his father on the phone he is nose to the glass, watching.
If anything was ever said to be truly mind blowing, it would be the nearly two thousand-mile journey these tiny birds make each year to return to their summer homes. To see them again is to find one’s own hope and courage renewed. Amen.
If I have come to live here for no other reason, I might consider the insight I’m given by living with my mother close by. While I have tried to discipline myself to see things from the half-full rather than half-empty perspective, my mother reminds me why this is still such a struggle for me. She is, inherently, a seer of the half-empty glass. And fundamentally, I think I may be so too.
“Nancy’s your mother?” people say with great interest. “What a great woman! I love Nancy!” they usually say. With too much back story to impart, and knowing it’s not really the point anyway, I usually smile and respond that yes, that’s what they all say. From an outsider’s perspective my mother is one upbeat person whose personality attracts. The same could be said about me too, I suppose. But as with anyone, there’s so much more to the person that is apparent at a first encounter.
The only person to ever bear intimate witness to the two sides of the Conant women was my near ex. He was quick to point out how similar I was to her. I would protest – for the woman I see is always muttering asides to herself under the martyred burden she constantly feels. My mother, when faced with new information, almost always responds with a victim-like disgust. It seems no matter what is offered, she feels it represents an unwelcome challenge and a burden that she herself will ultimately have to carry. And in light of the back story, I get it. Her own father left and began a new family cross town before he’d wrapped things up properly with her mother. This was in a pre divorce-as-common-occurance world. Her father hardly surfaced again in her life. This and more chapters help explain to me, at least, why she reacts as she does. In summary, she feels the world has screwed her, she has to fight for what she does have, and if she doesn’t do something that needs to be done, no one will. Whether she’s made her world fit her truth, or it existed like that in spite of her choices, I can see that many of her suspicions of the world have come true. After all, if she doesn’t work, there will be no bills paid. If she doesn’t make supper, Dad won’t eat. If she doesn’t do the laundry no one will. (Is this not the case for most mothers? I think we all have reasons to see our jobs as invisible and thankless at times.) But if she would just stay her knee-jerk tendency to groan about the prospects before she responded, she might find that things aren’t as doomed as she’s programmed to believe.
I don’t like to spend too much time in my parent’s house because of the thick and negative energy there. When my mother turns away from us, my father and I share knowing glances and shrug our shoulders in our shared powerlessness as she mutters to herself in the aftermath of what she’s perceived to be some gross wrong that has just been imposed on her. She lives on a vocabulary of passive-aggressive asides. When I try – sometimes ever so gently, sometimes in the anger of a shameful blowup – to call her attention to this, she takes it in without protest, but she never seems to hear me, or to get it. My near-ex said that my own negative tendencies (or the “Nancy” in me, he’d say) added to his desire to leave me. And to some extent I can understand this, however I’d offered that our situation was different; self-discovery and change was something I embraced, something I actively sought. I’d say we had tools and abilities available to us that our parents didn’t. He wasn’t moved. (His current girlfriend is to the outsider’s perspective a perennially cheery thing who, to me, seems to share some aspects of Betty Boop. Blonde, curly hair, a buxom figure and a super-high speaking voice that might do well in character parts, she is rather the polar opposite of me. Perhaps he needed to get as far away from the shadows of my essence as possible.) My parents are lost in the world of their own creation. At this late date there seems no desire to change. It’s not my business to enlighten them either.
So, in an effort to be a half-full person, I don’t try to impose my insights on my mother as a matter of course. Rather I study her. I notice her responses to things, and I reflect on how I might respond to the same. It helps me to see my own habits, and to understand what I’d do well to avoid. Seeing my mother, and how she lives in her own world has helped me to avoid going further down the poor-me path. In that we both share a story of father-leaving-family I can begin to understand how deep her pain goes. It’s a difficult assignment to turn this around, but I’m equipped and ready for the job. To choose up rather than down, possibility rather than hopelessness. I have a few tricks that I employ to help myself to see the reflection without wincing. My near ex once challenged me to replace ‘no, but’ with ‘yes, and’. It was a good suggestion; it’s a technique I come back to when I think I need some regulation in my outlook. I also realize that it’s easier to criticize than to complement (why is this and what does this say about we humans?) and so I curb my first reaction to express what’s displeasing, and instead, I offer my gratitude for what is pleasing.
And so I offer my gratitude for my mother and all she’s shown me about the world. I thank her for teaching me all the wonderful secret things that only a mother can. I thank her for the reflection of my own imperfections. I thank her for going before, and I hope that I can serve to resolve some of the issues that she’s labored under for so long. With the mirror of my mother I see who I am, and I begin to learn the things that I may yet become.
“I’m so happy and I don’t have to know why” shouts my son from his bedroom as he changes into his clothes for the day. “I’m full of it!” he continues. Now he’s singing the Woody Wood Pecker song as he rushes to the window to watch the birds outside. Love that kid.
Few can actually say they are in possession of a dead parrot. This is our beloved and late parakeet, Seamus.
His death was sudden and rather dramatic (and also cost $118 for a final attempt at reviving him with some sort of injected medical cocktail) and I found myself sadder than I would have thought at his passing. As I stood in the vet’s reception area, holding Seamus, who was neatly resting on a teal blue towel in a perfectly sized box, my thoughts turned to Elihu. Just as the woman behind the desk was handing me the brochure on how to talk to your children about the death of a beloved family pet, he spoke up. “Can we have him taxidermed?” he asked, without registering much emotion on his face. I recalled a little sign I’d once seen for a taxidermist’s shop up by the Greenfield hills and replied “Yes, I know a place.” I paused to consider the logistics. “We can go there now if you like”. He jumped up and clapped his hands in joy. With a disappointing audience of the somewhat humorless lady behind the counter, I threw the pamphlet over my shoulder in a ‘I give up’ sort of gesture, and we headed out the door with our ex-parrot in a box.
Note: Neither the mention of an ‘ex-parrot’ nor ‘how to put your budgie down’ is lost on my dearest Elihu. How much fun it is to have a child with that sort of twinkle in his eye, and that kind of material in his repertoire.Famous Seamus the Taxidermed Parakeet
Not directly related to anything currently in my blog, this is a journal entry I just rediscovered which was written in December of 2005. Although I was well aware that the immediate future was almost completely unknown to me, I could never, ever have begun to imagine how differently my life would pan out in the years to come. Painful though it’s been, I can honestly say now that I’m grateful everything happened the way it did…
It’s two thirty in the morning, and our Christmas party is quietly dying down. I can hear conversations – Fareed is still holding court with a few straggling guitar students, but I sense things are finally wrapping up. This, our 19th party, was our mildest. It was nice to see some very dear friends for what might well be our final party here. Here in this house, in our town, our world. I can hear the laughter of young, long-haired girls I don’t know, and I see the lights of a car turn around in our driveway. I am tired, and I hope nobody takes us up on our ‘5 to 5’ thing. Last year Ray Quinn showed up at four. Hope not this year. Really, it peaked Elihu’s first party. That was the year I wore the ‘sound of music’ gown. Acres of dark green silk and a crinolyn skirt underneath to push it out all around. The year I was still big from having a baby. The year the upstairs bathroom was torn up and not functioning. That was the year everyone came. Oh well. This year we finally got the bathroom and the kitchen done and no one shows. I shouldn’t say that, those who showed were family, and that was good. It was a good night. I am tired, and I am ready to say goodbye to this place. I remember years when dozens of us sang carols around the piano – sometimes twice in a party – but tonite that was not to be. A measly half dozen of us sang. Although a thin crowd, it was nonetheless a nice moment. But so short. Ah well. Time to move on it seems. I’m too tired to keep this event going these days. Man, am I getting old?? What the hell??
I made gallons and gallons of cider and wine. The first pots never even got finished tonite. In the old days I could NEVER make enough. Ich. I’m a little sad. I am waiting for everyone to leave, and for my dear husband to come upstairs. I’m waiting for us to put our arms around each other and sigh. We’ll recount the night, although I have no voice left and can hardly speak. He’ll run circles around me energy wise, and chide me for being so pooped. Well, the triumph of the night was young Master Elihu. He looked a vision in his black velvet Jon jon and shiny patent leather shoes. He was so well behaved, yet I feel I neglected him most of the night. He is such a good little man, that son of ours. I was kind of disappointed that all the kids found the loose tinsel and globbed gobs of it all down one side of the tree. But a small price for the joy it created. I think I’m as ready as I can ever be to leave this home of mine. I believe things are winding down here. I am excited to live on first street in Dekalb. I am ready. I know we’ll need time there for it to feel like home, and right now I’m not sure if I’ll ever feel that way again, but I’m ready to try. I’m ready for something else. Something else. I just don’t know what.
The first two years of Elihu’s life we two did indeed enjoy this place. Fareed was gone most of the time, so it was the two of us who did the exploring. We rode the neighborhood on my bike, we walked everywhere, we browsed the Salvation Army store and bought trinkets. I can recall so many little delights; an old fiber optic lamp that Elihu insisted on taking apart, a little toy piano that played in tune. We discovered many odd and unexpected objects which added interest to our long days together. We went to the beach too. We did this all. Sadly for me, Elihu never liked the beach, so the very thing that we might have actually enjoyed the most – had he been a kid without achromatopsia – was in fact the thing he most resisted. Once, as we walked hand in hand along the water he said to me “this is like walking in a nightmare”. That gave me a new insight into his world. I’d made it my life’s priority to always live as close to water as possible, now here was my kid just hating it. God damn it. At least I’d made sure we got to the beach a couple of times. I had so hoped my children would grow up walking distance from water. Now the water will be a river in our back yard. Oh Elihu, when you read this will you have grown up in Dekalb, never to have known what it is to live steps from the beach?? It’s so close, it could have been our life, but now it seems it’s not to be. Why?? I must remember that I am tired of living in a fishbowl of a house, of knowing that in my yard and garden I am always being seen by someone. If it weren’t for that silly monolith of a condo building across the alley it might be better, but I can see by the next warm season there’ll be even less privacy in our yard.
It will probably take us a good year to really feel ok in our new home, but I do think the change will come. I am sad, and I just want to get this over with. If we’re to have our second child, I need to be in my new home when she comes (Sarah’s still on the roof waiting…) If we’re going to do this, I need to get into my new home now. I know this is selfish and idealistic, but I feel I must make my new home soon.
North First Street. Or is it 1st? Does one spell out a numbered street? Hmm. I do so love our address: 520 Judson. It’s a very handsome address. So was 1122 Lunt. Hell, Orrington Lunt and Philo Judson were pals and created the first plats of the area. See? I know that kind of shit about my hood. Who the hell made the first plat of Dekalb? Who fucking cares? I don’t… yet. I’ll try.
I hear the hard soles of Fareed’s shoes walking the house as he turns off lights and amps. Good man. Yes, he’s a good man. It’s almost three now. I’ve expressed what’s been brewing inside, and what’s been underneath the whole night for me. Here he comes. Please come upstairs, my love. I want to go to bed. I am so tired, and my head hurts. And you know what? I really don’t want to have another Christmas party. Nineteen of em is enough. May our 20th find us cozy in our home by the woods, just us and a few dear friends gathered in love. God willing.
My birthday comes nine days after my son’s. While I was technically in my thirties when I had him, for all intents and purposes I was forty. So it’s easy math. I’m forty years older than he. (Good thing, because I’m easily thrown off by simple computations. This keeps things tidy.)
I share my day, May 7th, with Tchaikovsky and Brahms. While my ex was never sentimental about his own birthday (he shares his with Mozart), I am always rather fond of mine, and have always chosen my movements through the day with gentle consideration. When I was in my teens I would visit a lily of the valley patch by the banks of a neighboring canal, and just sit there, in quiet. I have always set time aside on each birthday to be alone in nature of some form. I wrote a song for myself when I turned 17, and it’s become something of a tradition that I play it for myself on that day. It’s a little melancholic thing that expresses a nostalgia for things lost and almost lost, a mood that I often found myself in for many years of my early adulthood. Its sound brings me back to the memories of that home, how the afternoon sun would throw the trees’ shadows on the stucco wall of the piano room, the sound of the cars rumbling over the canal bridge as I sat alone in the woods…
I can hardly recount the things I’ve done on my birthdays past. I can recall only a few out of so many. One I do remember was my 6th birthday. And I remember it because my mother made pink lemonade ice cream cake. I wonder if Elihu might possibly remember a childhood birthday decades hence for some such detail. I remember my thirtieth – a nice gathering of both my day job friends and my musician friends. I wore a serpent bracelet around my upper arm. I remember thinking at the time that I was chubby and unattractive. Sheesh. Couldn’t wind that snake around my arm these days.
Elihu suggested the family go to the Wishing Well for my birthday dinner. I was pleased with this; it’s a place that hearkens back to a pre-expressway America, with a silver-haired waitstaff, a floor of sound-muffling carpet and a sense of unrushed elegance in the room. I’m glad he made this lovely suggestion, for I have no real desire to go anywhere, to eat anything, to do anything special. My life is absent of much heartfelt and zealous desire these days, rather my energy it turned towards my list of things to learn and make here on my homestead. While these goals do represent a desire of sorts, they don’t have the same inherent element of excitement and energy as say, performing might have. I’ve been trying to think of something that I might enjoy experiencing on my birthday, but so far nothing much moves me. I’d like to take a walk in the woods and have some time alone. I’d really love to have a hundred dollars and a couple of hours to browse through some pretty clothes in a store. Neither is an option, so I will try to accept the day as it presents itself. Accepting what you’ve got is really all you can do.
I always consider a birthday to be as much the mother’s as the child’s. And for that reason I’m glad to be living here next to my own mother. It’s nice to be here for ‘her’ day too. I just wish we weren’t such a financial burden on her; she’s the only one in the family with a real job. She’s pulling us all along, and in fact, it will be she who picks up the hefty Wishing Well tab if we go. I so hope having her daughter and grandson next door makes up for it in some way. Most years on my birthday I have mom recount the story of my birth. It was a barbaric time in 1963 as far as labor and delivery went. They actually strapped her wrists to the gurney as she labored. No comfort was given, no movement allowed, no nothing. I can hardly believe it. I’m guessing that folks might even have been smoking in her presence… My mother was rather progressive for a woman in the midst of a culture that embraced invasive birthing techniques and encouraged drug-assisted births. She was adamant about having a natural birth, and in this atmosphere, with no advocate on her side, she stayed her course. (BTW – what the hell is natural about being strapped down as you deliver your child or having your entire pubic area shaved before you give birth?) I like to have her recount it, because it’s my way of affirming that this day also belongs to her. Elihu himself, on his own birthday one week ago, said “happy birthday to US, mommy”. He knows. Ok. I’m on deck…
The Hillhouse 