Tag: single mom

well, there it is. I’m a single mom. Another field-leveler. Guess I kinda regarded single moms with some disdain before my own change of life. Something I didn’t really know until I realized that I was myself now a single mom, and I realized I felt kinda sleazy and ashamed. Guess I’d thought of single moms as women who just kept getting knocked up without regard to their childrens’ welfare. Now, knowing the unending job it is to be such, I’ve come to respect my station and share a feeling of comradery with all those sisters out there who gotta do it all too. Sometimes I feel like kind of a ‘poser’ single mom; I mean I don’t have a 9 to 5, so sometimes I feel I’m not quite earning my badge. But by and large, I’m now proud of being a single mom, and I’m quite good at it.

Retro Post: How I Spent My Summer (2011)

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In filing a mass of papers from our life over the past year or more, I’m finding things that I’d like to share. For no particular reasons, and also for many tiny ones. So here’s Elihu’s first mandatory assignment of third grade; the classic summary of his summer vacation, an assignment for which he was given just four rather small boxes in which to recount his adventures. Hardly seems enough, but he gets his points across. I don’t keep any formal memory books, but I’ll archive these pages somewhere safe for us to revisit when Elihu’s kids are themselves writing little pieces kinda like this.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation by Elihu Haque (w/drawing of long-necked bird leaning in to inspect the title)

Flying RC planes. This plane has a four foot wingspan and flew above the clouds. My friends came to see.

Went to Chicago. Got to see old friends. It was fun to see my mom’s old friends. Got to play at Mom’s gig. (He sang at Fitzgerald’s with The Prohibition Orchestra of Chicago.)

Playing at the Green Mill. Played hand drums with dad. Played for one whole set. (Yup, he did. And tonite, all these months later, he is very likely on stage at the Green Mill playing his djembe while I am writing this.)

And overall it was a great summer, no I mean AWESOME!!

Bug at Home

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Guess I have today whatever bug Elihu had yesterday. In an uncomfortable sort of limbo. Not quite sick enough to throw up, but I feel each minute as if I should. Have had a constant headache since the morning. As evening falls I realize I’m quite hungry, but nothing appeals. For a brief window popcorn sounds ok. So I made a bag. Huge mistake. Not only did it not work (the chickens will thank me) but it made the whole house smell like popcorn. Yukk. I mean really yukk. I’d opened all the windows earlier today to air out the place and so I’ve kept them open to get rid of the smell. It’s getting pretty chilly now as it’s dropped to the lower forties outside again, so I need to close them up again. In what feels like a good measure of decadence, I turn the heat in the bedroom up to seventy. Usually I cut corners on the heat, but not tonite.

So here I am, hunkering down in my comfy chair, feeling a lot less than comfy, but at least I’m toasty now. Think I’ll give in and take something for this headache. If I had a bit more oomph I’d drive out to get some ginger ale, but I’ll forgo it now, as I’m dug in. I’m watching House Hunters International on HGTV, following the maps of each property search on my laptop. Thankfully, this is something that can pull me in enough to distract me from my discomfort.

I’ve always marveled at how many different ways there are in which to live. From my own travels – from Indonesia to Italy, I’ve seen so many corners of the world. But rather than give me a better idea of what my ideal home should be, it’s in fact done the opposite. I can never seem to identify what might feel like the perfect home. Really, for me, there is no such thing. This afternoon, as I felt so physically uncomfortable, I found myself longing for home. Silly, I know – I am home, right? Aside from the fact that I’ve been wrestling with the idea of this tiny, rural, upstate New York house feeling like home for the past three years (since I came here) there is yet another conflict inside me regarding true home. In that one moment today where I yearned for ‘home’, I paused to consider all the homes I’ve known. Which one was ‘the’ one? I played them all in my head, from the first I remember in New Haven, Connecticut to the Wilmette, Illinois home in which I lived in most of my life – and really, none was definitively home. (The closest one to my heart was still my beloved mid-century home in Evanston.)

I have nothing to complain about. Visitors take a breath when they first see the view here. There’s virtually nothing to be seen for a full three hundred and sixty degrees but trees, sky or field. And the house itself, while small, is just perfect for the two of us. My complaints might be that it’s drafty (there’s virtually no R rating to any of these fifty year old windows) and the obvious lack of landscaping in the immediate vicinity of the house (thanks to mud season, a lack of a driveway and the chickens) makes the place a little sketchy looking at first glance. And I like beautiful, not sketchy. Also, having lived all my life within spitting distance of other humans, I’m still just not used to being so alone. I’m thankful for my piano students and the families they bring along with them.

I wouldn’t mind being able to see my neighbors through the windows right now. But I think I feel like this because I’m sick. Feeling a little adrift, too, without Elihu. And since he’s with Jill and the boys in some hotel room in Indianapolis while Fareed plays a gig there (I only just learned these plans last night) it’s likely he won’t be calling me tonight. So that’s part of it.

Tomorrow this bug will be gone, and I’m sure I’ll feel more at home then.

Travel Plans

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It was to have been Elihu’s last day at Greenfield Elementary School today, but he awoke feeling sick. At first I’d wondered if this was real or exaggerated. But it turned out he really was sick. At least in the beginning of the day. Thankfully, he was feeling good by the time afternoon came, and he was fine when I drove him to the train this evening to meet his dad.

I had some errands to do in the early afternoon, and he came along with me, sitting in the back seat, quiet, patient, eager to be done. I ran in to his school to pick up the entries from the kids who want to be in the talent show, and on my way out was greeted by a couple of girls whom I’ve given piano lessons. They ran up to me and wrapped their arms around my waist – eager as much to hug me as to have their friends see them doing so. As I said goodbye to the kids (more of whom had now learned I was there and called out to me to be recognized), the principal caught me. “Is it true?” she said, eyes wide in search of the story. She spoke in a tone more like a fellow mother than an administrator. She didn’t need to finish her question, as her face told me she’d heard about Waldorf. “I’d wanted to talk to you – I didn’t mean to seem like we were just skipping out on you!” I answered. I went on to explain that it just happened so fast – it had gone from a dream to a possibility to a certain thing in what seemed to be a flash. I sputtered my best explanation as to why Elihu had chosen to attend Waldorf – the best I could do in the situation; kids were lining up to leave the noisy cafeteria, while other classes lined up to enter. Too much going on. I assured her I’d be there for the talent show – and that I hadn’t forgotten her ‘bit’, that I would coach her through it all. She laughed, and expressed her relief. (I’m planning on creating a rhythm line in which she, the school principal, plays the cowbell – the cornerstone of the ensemble – as others then add their part on top. A slight comic nod to Christopher Walken’s ‘fever for the cowbell’ bit on SNL). It was all I could do for now. Suffice to say we haven’t completely closed this chapter of our lives quite yet.

Elihu wasn’t that sentimental about missing the day either. He said he might easily have been, but he didn’t want to feel sad, so he was choosing not to dwell on it. That kid. Always so much more grown-up about things than I would be in his shoes. Or than I am in mine. ! I was kinda nostalgic all day. Glad I’d written a quick note of thanks and given it to his bus driver the day before. I’d really wanted to thank him for taking care of my son. He had a kind demeanor – evident from his simple wave good-bye as the bus departed each day, and I was grateful my child was in his charge. Glad I’d done that. Glad also that I’d be able to go back and make more thank yous and goodbyes over the next few weeks, because I truly do appreciate that place for giving Elihu his start in the world. From his kindergarten teacher we learned “you get what you get, and you don’t get upset”. Almost seems to me that it might have been the most important lesson of all that he learned there! I look back on the past four years, and realize that’s the length of a high school career, or college. Seems a good time to move on.

We two enjoyed a relaxed afternoon doing laundry, packing, setting up the incubator (which I must fill with eggs this week so that they’ll hatch in time for his upcoming 9th birthday party) and just enjoying each other in our last bit of time together before he leaves for Spring break. Elihu and I were tired today; it made both of us weak and silly. We sat in my bedroom’s cozy chair, he in my lap, making jokes and laughing over nothing at all.  Finally I needed to lie down, so I did, and he got on the bed next to me with his little diji game. It’s like a Nintendo DS, only it requires math problems be solved in order to make progress (in addition to shooting little alien guys and gobbling up point-scoring icons along the way). As I lay there watching him, I noticed the shape of his face and something rang familiar. Then immediately I flashed on an image of him as a mere babe of only a few months, and how his mouth had that same profile, that very same look – it was strange, but I could just picture him as a baby, yet at the same time I could still see him as he was. It was as if two moments in time had come together in some rare window of perception. Don’t know how to explain it better than that. It was a strangely poignant moment, one in which I felt how fleeting each moment is, and how quickly childhood becomes a memory. I lay there just looking at my beautiful child, just watching him, loving him, wishing all the most wonderful things for him in the life that lay yet ahead.

They sun was sinking, casting that warm, orange-tinged light on the neighboring fields and reminding us that we needed to get going. Elihu asked if he had time for just five minutes with his flock. I nodded, and he ran off through the trees towards them. He came back chasing the big rooster, Bald Mountain. It was comic as the boy ran after the bird, who dodged Elihu’s every lunge, leading the kid around in a fruitless chase. As I was pulling the car down the driveway, I saw the final, stop-frame moment: Elihu dove for the bird, grabbing just the very last of his tail feathers, and held on. Like a water skier pulling on a tow rope, he pulled himself along the tail, closer and closer to the prize. Finally he wrapped his arms around the bird. He had hoped I’d seen the catch, and eagerly brought the rooster to my open car window. “Awesome grab!” I said as he laughed with triumph. (That bird has attacked both of us so many times that it’s kinda nice to see the tables turned.) We smooch him, apologize for the rough treatment, then set him down. He shakes himself out, regains his composure and runs back to join his ladies. Finally we’re off to say goodbye to grandma and grandpa before we go to meet his father at the train.

The drive to Schenectady always seems so goddam long. I don’t know why it is, but the drives one has to make around this part of the world – to get anywhere other than where you currently are – all seem to take forever. When I think of the commutes I made in Chicago, I guess they were pretty similar in length, and Lord knows there are exponentially more traffic lights to deal with there, so I can’t really say why the commutes here feel so much more tedious. I don’t know why. Can’t explain it. But every single drive seems to take forever. And I never like the return trip after dropping Elihu off at the train. With Elihu suddenly gone, everything quiet, a kind of emptiness comes over me which makes the drive even more of a drag than it already is.

In spite of the drive, and in spite of the fact that part of me still can’t believe the situation which has me driving there in the first place (when, oh when will this feel like my ‘real’ life?) – I do look forward to seeing Fareed – more specifically, to seeing Elihu see Fareed. Our routine has us meeting at a dark little restaurant and bar across the street from the Amtrak station called the Grog Shoppe. Fareed is always there before us, Guinness on the table, phone to his ear. We always try to surprise his father – Elihu loves to sneak up on him as he sits waiting, unawares – yet it doesn’t always work. But today it worked! It was fun to watch from around the corner as Elihu appeared from nowhere and Fareed jumped up at the sight. It was a joyful reunion. Elihu was one very happy boy.

In no time, we three are laughing, having fun and sharing our own private jokes. This poor kid can’t escape all the classic comic references Fareed and I have tossed back and forth for the past two decades, and we throw out first lines of bits, hoping our child will answer back with the following line. (Caddyshack gets a good amount of air play.) We’ve ordered our food, but have over an hour. Plenty of time to relax. I decide it’s time to discuss my desire to take Elihu on an east-coast trip this summer to meet some Conant relatives. I’m hoping that mom can help with the cost, because it won’t be cheap, but it feels like an important trip to make. My Uncle Paul is 84, and there’s some urgency that the trip happen soon. Fareed understands, and I relax when I see that he won’t be battling me on this. He says this is good that we’re discussing plans, because he wants to figure out when Elihu can make the trip to Chile with his folks. Huh?! “I thought I emailed you on this” Fareed said unconvincingly. Apparently not. He knew my feelings about this. I’d made my conditions about Elihu and international travel plain. NO trips out of the country without me along. I wasn’t going to let Elihu go to Pakistan or Chile without me. Period. “You’ll have to talk to my folks about that” Fareed says. I say I’ll call tonite when I get home. “You can’t.” he says. “They’re in Spain.” Again, huh?? “At their age? They’ve gone to Europe?!” I can’t believe it. Seems Elizabeth, my mother-in-law’s neice, has traveled from Chile to New York to accompany them. Wow. And I literally don’t have enough money to buy milk, let alone gas. I don’t dwell on it. It’s just part of the crazy world of Fareed. I know, I’ve lived in it for twenty five years now. You just gotta shake your head and roll with it.

If it’s that important to them, they’ll take me. They’ll take us both. As it looks from this very moment, it seems quite likely that Elihu and I will be going to South America this summer. Looks like it might be a year of travel. No one’s getting any younger, and there’s family to be met around the globe. At nine, Elihu is a good age to travel, as he’ll remember his experience and learn a lot from it. I myself remember a trip to Switzerland at the age of six. In fact, it is a bright, vivid memory full of color and details. I know this kind of an adventure will help shape Elihu’s life in a profound way. Deep down, I am glad for this sudden news. I sense the possibility of wonderful things to come.

We’ve had our meal and need to pay. Fareed has just realized that we’ve relaxed perhaps a little too much; we have under ten minutes to make the train. Thankfully, we’ve just gotten the bill. The restaurant is packed, and our poor waitress is alone on the floor. I remember those days well. I want to share her stress as if it might lighten her load somehow, but it won’t, so I cast it off. It’s her drama, I can’t share it, I don’t need it. I have my own. Fareed pays while Elihu and I gather up his guitar and bag and head out. The train is literally pulling into the station as we arrive.

On the platform we hug, and Elihu says to me what he now says to all his family upon departing or saying goodbye: “Love you so much”. It’s a sweet little phrase that he just started using one day. It conveys his intense and sincere feelings so well, and it’s always touching to hear him say it, no matter to whom. I say “Goodbye, love you” as he turns away, and then when Fareed hugs me and turns to leave, I have to edit my impulse to say the same to him. I shouldn’t say I love him, right? I mean, after the way he’s treated me, the absence of real concern for me – how can I still feel any tenderness for this man? Yet seeing him go still tugs a little. Ok. It tugs a little less. I guess that’s progress.

This time, I don’t linger on the platform, following them through the cars, waving as they glide off. I head back to the doors. One lone traveler is told by the conductor he must go back downstairs to the ticket booth and get a paper ticket before he can board. I hear the hissing of the train and see the panic in the man’s face as he runs back to the stairway. I’ve been there too. I feel his stress, and I want to share it, to lessen his load. But I can’t, so I let it go too. I have my own load.

I do end up using my cell phone as a high-end walkie talkie, calling them to see if they can see me standing on the corner, waving. No, this time they don’t. So without fanfare, we say goodbye. For the first time ever, I get in my car and leave before the train does. I guess this is progress too.

The drive is still a little empty, but the full moon helps distract me from dwelling on it. Soon I’m pulling alongside my house, the vast expanse of hills before me, stars and moon bright and crisp above me. I look up and out at the infinite. I sense the space, the possibility…  Tonight I will put off til tomorrow the chores that I might otherwise set to right away. I won’t bother with the dishes, or the post-packing mess in Elihu’s bedroom. Maybe I’ll write a post, get this crazy ‘trip to Chile out of nowhere’ bomb off my chest. I don’t know. But the wonderful thing is – I am free to do that if I please. I am also free to do absolutely nothing if I please. Truly, I am free. How lucky am I? Very lucky. And very grateful too. I love being a mother, but it sure feels good to have a moment alone every now and then. Nothing like having the house all to yourself.

Just now there was a small interruption in my first night alone, but it’s a welcome one: the phone rang. Elihu said he was calling to say goodnight. That was it. Then he said “Love you so much” and hung up. Love you too, Elihu. Sweet dreams.

One story ends, another begins. Greenfield Elementary to Waldorf of Saratoga. Cape Cod to Chile. On with the adventure…

Transition Time

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Elihu and I are tired. I slept all of maybe three hours total last night. He too had a strange night. Lying in bed, waiting for the gears in my brain to wind down, I suddenly heard the urgent thumping of feet on the floor in the hall. My son seldom wakes in the night (in fact he is such a deep sleeper it’s becoming a real challenge when it comes to some, shall I say, ‘personal’ issues that result in many extra loads of laundry) and so I instantly jumped up in high-alert mommy mode. I found him in the bathroom, throwing up. Oh no, I thought. He may only have two days left at Greenfield Elementary, I hope he doesn’t have to miss one of them. I pulled some toilet paper off the roll to wipe his mouth. “Don’t touch me” he said, taking the paper and cleaning his face. My feelings could have been hurt, but they weren’t. I know that when you’re sick sometimes you need to be left alone. We both stood there for a minute, waiting on another possible round. Nothing. A moment passed. “That was weird” he said. Then he turned and shuffled back to his bed and I swear he was literally asleep within seconds. I lay down next to him thinking he might open his eyes and say ‘stay’, like he does sometimes when he’s not feeling well, but he was gone, returned to deepest slumber. I hoped for the best and returned to my own sleepless bed.

I’m a little hesitant to reveal the measures I took last night in order to sleep – none of which worked – as it may seem rather extreme. But in spite of my radical self-medication I didn’t lose track of the clock til well past five. I took 8 over the counter sleeping pills, 12 mg of melatonin plus some valerian root for good measure. I tried concentrating on my breathing, visualizing peaceful waves, clearing my mind of all thoughts, and when that didn’t work I tried imagining my garden, home and coop as I’d hoped it might look one day – nothing did the trick. I tried vacating the swirling to-do lists from my mind by writing them down. I did everything I knew how to do. I recall my mother once saying – and perhaps she was in turn quoting another woman, I’m not sure –  that she thought all the women of the world who were wide awake between 2 and 5 am could solve the world’s problems if they could just get on one big conference call. She was referring to the dreaded ‘change’ that, from what I heard her and the other older women in my life talking about, would rob me of sleep for months at a time, ultimately never allowing me to fully return to a proper sleep routine. Is this what’s going on? Since I had my Mirena put in this past fall I’ve hardly had a period. I don’t exactly know where my body is on the timeline with respect to menopause. Could be that. Could also just be the usual suspects; a zero balance on my food stamp account, unpaid debts, household repairs I can’t afford and so on.

Even after my long night, I still did my motherly best at seven thirty this morning and pulled my groggy body to Elihu’s room to wake him. He was so deeply asleep that shaking him didn’t even register in the flicker of an eyelid. Nothing. Was he sick or just sleepy? No fever. No other signs. Probably just pooped, like me. I crawled into bed next to him, telling myself we’d be a half hour late for school just this once. Then I fell asleep. An hour passed like a second, and now Elihu was waking me. “What time is it?” he asked, mild panic in his voice. I told him not to worry.  Although we were still just a few hours away from learning whether or not the faculty at the Waldorf School of Saratoga would formally agree to accept him as a student, we were pretty sure they would. That meant that he had only two days left of school here in Greenfield; so getting there on time seemed a bit less urgent.

I took a leap of faith and began to wrap things up with his school after I dropped him off. Paid the cafeteria gals what I owed, then told them the news. They like Elihu, and he likes them. In his four years at the school he has praised the kitchen ladies many times, admiring them for their hard work and good cooking. (Perhaps his genuine appreciation might be due in part to his up close and personal witness to one single mother’s efforts to create good food for her son and all that it entails…?) He was particularly impressed by a visit to the cafeteria’s own herb garden that he once made with his first grade class (and to this day often confesses to me that he sneaks little samples from it at recess). The gals there told me they’d miss him; he was truly a good boy they said. Polite, quiet and kind. And appreciative. Don’t think too many lunch ladies know what it is to have the heartfelt respect and gratitude of an eight year old boy.

Onto the school nurse. While her over-zealous care has driven me and many other Greenfield moms a little crazy (insisting on pulling kids out of school and sending them to the doctor when a tick is found in their hair after recess) I do have her to thank for including us on the list of needy households, and doing so in such a way as to preserve our dignity and privacy. I can remember one Christmas, sitting in a kid’s sized chair in her office, crying, sobbing really, filling my kleenex as she and the school’s counselor stood by, listening, witnessing, just being there. It was she who’d asked me what we really needed – and it was she who saw to it that we received a set of queen sized sheets, so that I might have a second pair for Elihu’s bed. It was she who made sure we got a box of food delivered to us before school let out, so that we’d have food at home over the holiday break. She may have been a little too uptight in some ways, but I will always be grateful for her help in those first, difficult years here. She prints out a copy of Elihu’s immunization record, slips it into an envelope, and, since she’s not the hugging type, I thank her and say goodbye.

Then it’s to the attendance lady. Man, she’s a tough cookie. Everyone knows it. An attractive middle aged woman whose husband owns the local auto repair shop, she’s no-nonsense and to the point. No mercy for the “but we’re just one second late” lamentation. Yup, she’s the right woman for the job. We’ve chatted many times, and in the wake of more tardies and unexcused absences than she approves of, we’ve nonetheless struck a friendly relationship. She gives me the proper form to fill out, and of course, in her presence I miss a couple of items, so she has to complete it for me. Sheesh. But then, as if a quick karmic free pass for me, she discovers an error of her own, and I joke to her that I feel better now. She smiles to me and shakes her head, glasses in hand, “Elihu’s an icon!” she says. “It won’t be the same here without him.” I tell her I do agree, because it’s true. Everyone knows Elihu. The kid with the huge, dark glasses. The one who sits alone in the cafeteria because he needs some peace. The one who doesn’t hear the bell because he’s got his nose in a book, the one who comes trudging down the hall long after everyone else has gone on ahead. The kid who draws all those birds. That’s my boy. Yup, he will be missed. I assure her we’re gonna miss everyone here too. Cuz we will.

But it’s not quite over. I still have to run the talent show, and there’s a long road ahead of me. Lots to learn, lots to get done. I’m feeling a little conflicted as I root around in the Home School Association’s mail bin in the main office, looking for the talent show entries. I’m running the talent show, but I won’t have a kid in the school. Is that even legal? I wasn’t sure we’d even get this far in the Waldorf process way back when I volunteered. I know it’s all fine. The timing is just a bit off. Ever since I’d joined this world nearly four years ago, I’d always looked with wonder at the mystery of the ‘involved’ parent. Might I be qualified to join that club myself? I wasn’t so sure, but I wanted to try. Years ago, as a means of purging the emotional residue of my many years of athletic ineptitude, I’d joined a co-ed softball team in Chicago. I wasn’t any good at first, and I wasn’t great at the end of my tenure, but somewhere in the middle I actually got better, and I got the hang of it. And it no longer seemed like something ‘other’ people did. This is the spirit in which I volunteered to run the talent show. I wanted to learn how those parents did it. I wanted to get it. So here I was, about to become an official school mom. Just in time to see my kid leave the place. Oh well. Better late than never, I guess.

Shortly after I got home, the phone rang. It was the admissions director from Waldorf. In her rich, alto voice she told me – in beautiful, almost archaic-sounding language – that it gave her “great pleasure” to report that Elihu had been accepted into the school by the faculty today. Even though we knew it was nearly a done deal, it hadn’t truly been until now. I nearly cried. I thanked her, I thanked her, I thanked her. I could never have believed that such news could feel so good, so victorious, so hopeful, so uplifting. My son was going to a place where he would be understood. Where they would get him. Finally, my dear, different child would feel at home. Finally.

Country Boys

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I feel a bit disappointed that we’d forgotten it was April first today, and as such missed out on the opportunity for some good April Fool’s day trickery, but in the end that hardly matters when I look back on the joy of our weekend.

On a whim I’d driven Elihu ten miles across town to visit a friend on Saturday afternoon. No one had been answering the phone at his friend’s place, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be home. Elihu’s pal has three siblings and just about any given day there’d be at least half a dozen kids outside in the tiny yard riding bikes or kicking a ball around. I figured it was worth taking a chance. My ultimate goal had been to pick up Keith then swing by another classmate’s house, thereby getting all three boys together to try out an idea I’d had for an act they might do at this year’s talent show (I’m in charge of running the thing this year – I’ll undoubtedly be making a post or two on that experience. While I’m confident I can bring out the best in the kids’ performances, the logistics have me more than a little nervous.) We were surprised to find the whole family out – but his Aunt Sharon emerged from the tiny house, cigarette in hand, and told us to check back in about an hour. So up the road we went to pay a visit on his other pal.

Ever since I was a small kid I can remember being intrigued by the ramshackle homesteads scattered throughout the community here. Tiny compounds made up of various outbuildings, ancient rusting cars and every manner of household cast-offs laying broken and unused in every direction, weeds and brambles growing up around the whole mess. At the center of the property there would most often be an ancient, equally neglected trailer. I remember thinking how incredibly depressing it looked, how desolate and hopeless a place in which to live. It made me literally sick in the stomach to imagine what that reality might feel like. But did these people think so too? Were they trapped by their own hopelessness? Could they find no inner resolve to tidy up their land? Or – were they actually perfectly content to live like this?

Shortly after we moved here three years ago and befriended some of Elihu’s poorer, more rural classmates I finally got to know some of these places from the inside. Finally, my anthropological curiosity would get some answers. Elihu’s pal Colty lives in such a place. And you’d never guess. This boy is just about the cutest, most charming little kid you could ever hope to meet. He is one in millions. Cheerful, loving, sweet and unedited in his joy for life, he is clearly not bothered by the place in which he lives; I believe he is inspired by it.

He lives in a trailer, one which has been added on to over the years, resulting in a choppy profile from the outside which leaves the first time visitor wondering which door to approach. Even after having been there several times, I ended up choosing the wrong door. This is Colty’s dad’s place – and I know he stays here on the weekends. During the week he lives with his mother across town. His dad is out right now, and the kid is thrilled to see us, as some teenager has been left in charge and sits on a sagging couch mindlessly watching The Suite Life on Deck on an enormous flat screen tv. Colty immediately begins to give us a tour of the place. He takes off down the dark corridor and beckons us to follow. We arrive in a room (added onto the trailer to the side) where his dad keeps all his hunting stuff. It is filled with things I can’t quite identify and the windows are covered with ratty pieces of cloth. There is a lot of camouflage about. I can’t make out much in my quick look around, but at once I can recognize the smell of wet linoleum and mildew. It is a scent that I have known since I was little. A smell that has always reminded me of my own childhood when I too would visit my poorer neighbors and tour the interiors of their musty homes. After showing us this side porch he returns to the main room where a mounted ten point buck’s head serves as a hat rack for an assortment of brimmed caps. I remember that once his dad had made an old 60’s console tv into a fish tank. I didn’t see it on this visit, but forgot to ask about it as I was so busy taking in all the other details. Now our inside tour is finished, so Colty asks the teenager on the couch if he can go out and play. I assure him I’ll stay with the boys. He nods his ok, so off we go, leaving the blaring tv behind.

Colty is lucky to live on one very fine piece of property. Once you leave the trailer, the hound dog in his kennel, the chicken coop, garage and assorted vehicles behind, a vast field stretches out before you, gradually sloping down to a good sized pond at the far end. The sight conveys a thrilling sense of being in the wide-open. The horizon is hilly and pine-covered, and with everything visible in one frame, it almost seems as if you’re looking at a tiny diorama. The trails that his father has carved thru the brush for his four wheeler invite the adventurer on. Colty is thrilled to give us a tour. “I know this place like the back of my hand” he says, and begins to list off the sights he can show us; his worm farm, his pet mouse hole, the coyote den, the best place to find crayfish – he assures us he’ll be happy to show us anything we want to see.

We come upon a pile of old chairs and other household garbage. I can’t help but notice these are some very nice mid century pieces, and I lament their state of ruin. No fixing these. I sit in one as Colty and Elihu run off to look for things that only eight year old boys can fully appreciate. After a while they return and we head for the pond. A nicely-flowing creek runs out of the pond, and the boys run across the bridge and slip down the banks to look for creatures. I sit with my feet dangling over the planks and I drink in the sound of running water, I breathe in the cool, clean air. The boys return with salamanders. For a good half hour they run up and down the banks, creating rules and setting agendas in a world all their own. I lay down on the bridge and look up at the branches just beginning to bud. I like this. Cool, not hot, fresh but not cold. And no mosquitoes. A rare slice of perfection.

The water segment of our tour comes to a close and the boys follow a path through the tall pine trees towards the other side of the pond. I follow. We come out of the woods onto the foot of a great hill of lawn surrounded by giant oaks. Robins are everywhere on the grass. Elihu can’t see them and so I tell him to run – and he startles dozens of them. Happily he sees them as they fly away. As we walk up the hill we discover tiny round fungus of some sort in the grass. Each looks like a tiny stove top jiffy pop container with a hole in the middle. We discover that by either stepping on them or squeezing them between our fingers they emit a poof of dust. The boys do a tap dance on the lawn and millions of spores cloud the air. When this diversion is finished, Colty leads us further up the hill and points out a huge wall of sand in the distance. It appears to be a mountain cut in half, it’s sandy contents spilling out and onto the grass.

At first I hadn’t planned on following the boys all the way up the hill, but in the end it was an opportunity I couldn’t miss. I took my time, taking the crude road up the side of the hill while the boys, shoes and coats now flung off, started up the nearly vertical wall of sand to the top. Once at the top of the hill, I was stunned to realize how high up we were. From our elevation I could see my friend’s saltbox house a half mile away, and I could identify the ridge she always mentions when the coyotes call in the evenings. I was on one branch of that ridge. Not quite as high, but from here I could see what felt like forever. I stood on a spot that was now far above the tops of the great oak trees we’d just stood underneath. I found a good spot to sit, my feet braced against a root, and I watched the boys. They tumbled down, they tackled each other, they dug great holes in the sand, they laughed and laughed.

We took a break from the sand and explored the woods atop the ridge. We came upon a spot where each pine tree trunk was virtually identical. It looked simply mysterious and we couldn’t resist leaving the path and meandering through the forest for awhile. Not wanting to end up lost or too far away, we headed back to the sandy wall of the mountain before long. The boys then passed another half hour tumbling down the hill when I decided it really looked like way too much fun to pass up myself. And so I too tumbled down, walked back up and tumbled down again. We three had the most wonderful time; the kind of fun that epitomizes all our recollections of what childhood should be. And in the midst of one joyful moment of many that afternoon, Colty burst out “this is the best day ever!” and Elihu and I agreed.

After a couple hours’ play we headed back to the house. On the way up from the pond we met Colty’s dad, who gave the boys a ride back through the field on his four wheeler. Remembering why we’d come in the first place, we asked his dad if we could visit Keith for a bit. Colty’s got an impressive talent – he’s one hell of a dancer who moves with the kind of ease that no amount of lessons can teach. I’d hoped to get Elihu playing hand drum, Keith doing his beatboxing, and Colty doing his thing as the other two played. So we all piled into my car and went back down the mountain to  see Keith. When we pulled in there was a confusion of kids, cars and dirt bikes swirling about. Keith’s dad offered to give Elihu a ride on the four wheeler while Keith and his brother made jumps and wheelies to impress us. While all manner of bikes and balls were flying about I decided to seize the moment. I ran to my car, returning to the garage with a small amp, microphone and djembe. I wasted no time setting it up. I made an announcement in the mic and thankfully could be heard over the whining engines. It worked. All three boys came to the garage, and in a few minutes I was finally able to test out my idea for the talent show. And it even looked promising. This just might work. Elihu got his signature groove going on the djembe, Keithie did his beatbox thing on the mic, and lil Colty did what he could in the small, dirty space, his head, arms and shoulders popping out a cross-body wave to the music.

We set on a plan to get together over the next few weekends to work up an act and practice. I was happy that it would work. Happier still – because it was my deeper, more honest goal in this endeavor – that I’d managed to get two boys to participate in something they wouldn’t have otherwise. Theirs is a world different from Elihu’s and mine. A world of dirt bikes and atv trails, of long, unscheduled time outdoors, a life of rough and tumble boys who wear camouflage and go hunting with their fathers. It’s not a world where moms and dads sign their kids up for talent shows or after school drama club.

Even though this was not our own world, we were always made to feel welcome. And hopefully, I would make these boys feel welcome in our world too. Although these three boys may have grown up differently, they have one thing in common for sure. They are country boys. And what a great thing to be.

Dad, Here, Now.

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It feels surreal and foreign, yet it feels mundane and everyday. At once it is rare, at once it is common. Fareed is here, right now, at nine o’clock at night, helping Elihu assemble a model airplane. Right now it feels as if he lived here with us, as if it he was here every night, having supper, wrestling on the bed with his son in a prehistoric reenactment of dinosaurs colliding, assembling an airplane of balsa wood on the kitchen table. I can’t really remember when he was last here. But I think it’s been awhile. I think. A couple months maybe, not quite sure. Sometimes, on nights like this, when Fareed is here, when Elihu is laughing and at his very happiest to have his mother and father together, it seems the greatest shame of all that Fareed does not, in fact, live here with us, his family. I know I should let this whole thing go, but still, I keep wondering why, how… How could it have come to this – where we three are not a family living under one roof but separated by a thousand miles. I know many reasons why we aren’t, but I think a small part of me will forever lament our current reality. I sigh, shake myself awake and out of my longing, and try to make friends with things as they are.

It was a very dramatic day. Fareed’s train was six hours behind schedule due to a derailment on the track. He therefore had to hop off in Cleveland, get on a plane and then be driven from Albany to our tiny town, all in time for a 6:30 curtain. Luck was with him today. I was amazed. With one logistic hitch after another, Fareed finally entered the school’s parking lot at the very same moment we did, for a bizarre but exciting reunion of father and son.

While I’d been so excited for the surprise reunion of father and son, it was not to be as Fareed had come clean to Elihu last night about his plans. However, seeing him pull up at the very same moment as we did was indeed surprising in of itself. We weren’t quite sure Fareed would even make it. But he did. And the show was sweet. Elihu had a speaking part which he nailed. He delivered it clearly and unrushed, unlike most of his classmates. Parents of his friends were there, my folks were there, my brother, my son’s father. And many of the folks in our life here got to meet Fareed, and Elihu got to see his father witness his own world, and it was good. My parents hadn’t seen Fareed for a few years – not since he revealed his new family situation and his desire for a divorce. If my father hadn’t been so frail and aged he might have been more upset. But he wasn’t. And that was good. My mom too, she seemed more comfortable seeing him than I might have guessed. Maybe time does help dull the emotional impact. I was glad to see all aspects of my son’s life happily merging together tonite.

Fareed naps right now, Elihu snuggled beside him. Any minute my brother Andrew will be here to take him to the airport, and Fareed will quietly get up, gather his things and tiptoe out of the house. Elihu will awake tomorrow morning, and his father will be gone once again. It’s made a little easier this time knowing that Easter break is right around the corner, and they’ll see each other again soon. So this time it’s not as hard.

Whatever may yet be, it’s so good to see Elihu with his dad, right here, right now.

Surprise Visit

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My son will be visiting his father in Illinois for the Easter break. We know this, but we just don’t know the exact plans, as Fareed will likely do a fair amount of juggling and cancelling of things to make it happen. We’re never sure until about a week before what the exact plans will be. But we know that Elihu will see his father soon. Didn’t know just how soon til a couple of minutes ago…

I got an email from my almost-ex saying that he arrives at the train station tomorrow at 2 pm, can I please pick him up, then he departs from the Albany airport at around 6 am the next morning. Huh?? Why this crazy, last-minute, unexpected overnight visit that comes with no more than a 24 hour warning?? Well, mostly because Fareed is being Fareed. He is living fast, making up rules on the fly, changing plans and pissing people off along the way, and doing it all with the charm of a super slick salesman.

Ultimately, he is being a good dad. And honestly, I’m pretty happy for Elihu. He will friggin flip to see his father, unannounced, show up in time to attend his third grade concert “Of Mice and Mozart” in which he plays a mouse with a small speaking role – one he memorized the very first time he read it. Elihu sings his Mozart tunes constantly as he moves about the house, busying himself with airplane-related projects. (He’s taken a new and ultra-keen interest in all contraptions that fly; it’s as obsessive and all-encompassing as his love of birds.) So just imagine the moment when an unsuspecting kid gets off the bus to find his father waiting there – the father who lives a thousand miles away and isn’t due to be here for another week yet. Elihu will FLIP OUT. Really, I can’t wait. But first, I gotta process a little exasperation here.

You see, I do have a life. I have appointments, things to do, obligations and such.  Tomorrow I need to be at school at 3:30, as I have a meeting about the upcoming talent show. I’m running it this year along with two other friends who, like me, haven’t the foggiest what this whole project entails. So tomorrow we will be tutored by the women who ran it last year. But I cannot make the meeting on time if Fareed’s train is late – which it may well be. Plus I have to drive my mother to have cataract surgery – and drive her back.  And I’d planned on visiting my bankruptcy attorney somewhere in the mix too. I just don’t see how the hell I can do it all.

I called my mother to vent, but she wasn’t as fazed by it as I’d thought. It’s usually she who fans the flame and gets all worked up by Fareed’s craziness… But she was calm and collected and just suggested that maybe my brother Andrew could go get him. Or get her. Whatever. Not a big deal. ?? A little frustrated by my lack of a good audience, I said goodbye to Mom and then re-checked my email. Fareed had responded. Said he’d been talking to Elihu about these plans. But let’s remember, they’ve got a scheduled visit coming up next week – why should Elihu expect his dad to come out any sooner? Elihu probably thought his father was referencing the upcoming Easter visit. And, uh, ahem, how about telling me your plans ahead of time?  Maybe a quick email to the mother of the child being visited? Whatever. I guess I’ll have to take my mom’s uncharacteristically chill attitude. Fareed even says in his message that he doesn’t want me to miss anything. Hookay. Maybe I’m making too big a deal of this. As long as my mom can get to and from her cataract surgery comfortably, and as long as I get to my after school meeting, then I guess it’s all ok. But still, why couldn’t he have told me his plans just a couple days ago? Sheesh.

I’m not going to tell Elihu. I’m just going to savor that moment when I come to meet him after school and Fareed is magically there beside me. I think the poor kid’s head might explode. I can’t wait.

Spring Morning

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Nothing to report, aside from the fact that I can seem to get nothing done right now. It is a lovely Spring morning, a gentle breeze moves through the house and the roosters crow from far-off corners of the property. I have now three day’s worth of dirty dishes sitting in the sink as well as taking up all of my modest counter space, and I am acutely aware that I have not yet washed them. However I cannot make myself move. Usually I set to work as soon as Elihu is off to school. I don’t stop working until order is restored. But today, I just cannot summon the inspiration. I sit here, in my comfy bedroom chair, doing absolutely nothing. Just feeling the cool, fresh breeze and enjoying the distant sounds of my wandering flock.

My son and I had a morning of laughter and silliness, improvised poems and songs. We walked the expanse of our future garden, assessing our plans, marking off a small plot by placing a rock in the dirt to mark each corner. A neighbor from down the road (the grandson of the man who’d built our house and first tilled the garden here forty years ago) had recommended we start small. Last fall we had plowed a huge swath to prevent brambles from gaining a foothold on the old garden – a good hundred feet long by twenty five feet wide – and knew this was too much for us to manage. This morning, Elihu and I decided what we could manage.

We realize that we need to be headed back up the hill soon. Our morning had been leisurely, and this meant I’d have to drive him to school. We are lucky; his school is just two miles down the road and we can be there in less than five minutes. I start the car, but then Elihu brings a hen to my window. I roll it down and smooch the hen he calls Shirley Nelson. She is an Araucana and has sprays of feathers just under her eyes which remind me of the sideburns on a gentleman in an ancient sepiatone photograph. She is the one who lays the slender, pale green eggs. We coo to our little hen, thank her for being who she is, then he gently places her down and gets into the car. We set off down the long driveway, the car bouncing over the deep ruts and holes the winter has left behind.

Coming up over the crest of cemetery hill, I can see the forest tops spread out before me, and I see the buds beginning to color the trees – I see distinct patches of yellow, pale orange, dark purple. Spring is coming a little early. I don’t care, I’m so happy to see it again. Such renewal – such a refreshing of the spirit comes with this season. I cannot imagine how one can become rejuvenated without the benefit of such a change of season. What is it to live in Florida? Or California? Or any of those other places in which there is so little change of seasons? What they are missing! Oh, this feeling of hope and anticipation that comes to life with the first scents of Spring! If it weren’t for the snow that fell only weeks ago – how could I possibly come to appreciate this lovely new climate as I do? Elihu and I are in a fine mood today. A Spring mood.

As I drop him off, he says “Goodbye, Mommy, I love you” and my heart is full, full, full. I treasure this moment in our lives, when he is young, when he is close by, when Spring is just returning. The dishes can wait, this fine Spring moment can’t.

Our Molly

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Our dear white hen, Molly, died this morning. I went in to the mudroom to check on her and give her the morning meds when I found her, lying on the floor. Although her feet were cold, her body was still supple and at least felt room temperature. Looks like she’d just died. Maybe less than an hour ago. I look for clues, signs of how she died, why she died. I see a puddle of liquid around her mouth. She’d thrown up something. I just knew these past two days she was getting far worse. I wonder, did I do the right things? Did I fail her this second round? Since my back’s been out I’ve not been keeping a good schedule with her, and I’ve missed a couple of doses. Was it that? Something tells me no, she was just too far this time. Past few days she’d been burying her head far into her neck feathers – a new posture I’d not seen before – it signaled to me that she was worse. Yesterday, for the first time ever, her tail drooped to the floor. And yesterday she collapsed a couple of times. I took that to mean she needed calories, so made an effort to get a concoction of yogurt and high-end feed into her gullet. Did I force feed her to her death?

In the end, of course none of it matters. But I must take something away from this, lest she have died in vain. And after stroking her feathers and going over the past few weeks in my head, I come to the conclusion that in the past few days I was just prolonging her discomfort; I was trying to keep her alive for my benefit, not hers. I ask her to please forgive me for this. I knew damn well she was not feeling good – that she was feeling very bad, she might have been in horrible pain for all I know – but regardless I sought my goal, rather than the goal I should have pursued: that of her comfort.

I don’t tell Elihu til after breakfast. He’s much more stoic than I. He doesn’t burst out into tears, he just gets up and walks in to the mudroom. He strokes her, then picks up her head to look closer, to glean anything he might, then he lays her back down. I leave for a moment and when I return he’s still there, just looking at her. I join him, we hold hands and just sit. Then I allow myself to cry. I haven’t cried in a long time. I must need this, because the tears are pouring out of me, spilling onto my dear, white hen. I look at Elihu, who is not crying. Instead, he puts his hand on my shoulder. I pull myself together. We talk about where to bury her, and decide it should be under the flowering quince bush. All the birds love that spot, and on sunny days they like to rest there after a day of wandering the property. Yes, that’s perfect. Just perfect.

I drive Elihu to school, then come back home to tidy up. To take care of a dead hen. First, I sit with her, and I try to understand what it is that still nags at me about her death. And then I get it. I knew she was uncomfortable, but I chose to ignore it. But I knew better. So in the future, when an animal is not feeling well, and I’ve already done my best, I will have mercy on them and put them down before they suffer any more. Thank you dear Molly for reminding me to be a better caretaker to my flock.

And thank you for making our homestead so cheery these past three years. How many times I’d stood at the sink, washing dishes and looking out the window at my happy flock, spread wide across the lawn and woods, scratching, ever scratching, flinging leaves behind them as they searched the dirt for tasty bugs. Most of our chickens are red, some lighter, some darker, but mostly they are all of subdued, darker shades. Except for one. I could always find Molly at a glance. She was our bright spot in the flock.

We’ll miss our dear white hen.