The inimitable Brooke tagged me.  Even though she is inimitable, I am still going to try and copy her a little bit here, slightly using her template.  I am just way to beat down, exhausted, ready to scream bloody murder at those little imps who insist on torturing me every moment of the day  tired to think for myself.  My list of Seven Random:

 

1. Seven is my favorite number.  I am the seventh child. In numerology my birthday breaks down to the number 7.
2. I was raised by a Sicilian-American professional bookie.
3. My life-in-cocktails break down like this:  Crown Royal and Kool-Aid; Keg Beer; Jim Beam and Ginger; Whiskey on the rocks, twist of lime; Cosmopolitans; Vodka on the rocks with mint, a twist of lemon and a splash of tonic; Dry Red Wine.
4. I kissed Dave Mathews once.  I won’t call it a French kiss because it lasted about 3.5 seconds, but our lips parted and danced for a moment in time about 12 years ago. I did not see sparks.
   
5. I gave my high school commencement speech high on whip-it’s.
6. Jack Black would be on my list of famous people to have dinner with.
7. I have seven tattoos.

 

I tag anyone who feels pulled to write their Seven.

 

 

On Sunday we all woke up in this bed with the sun shining in through the windows.

 

It seems as if every couple days the sun surprises us, reminds us that all that talk of dreariness perhaps was not as extreme as we envisioned it.  Still though, we take the sun shining in and the autumnal crisp air as a sign to explore, to strap on our walking shoes and examine all the nooks and crannies of our new town.  I suppose sooner or later winter will hit and the rain will come and the dark will take over and we’ll all seriously hibernate.  But today we expose ourselves to the light.  We walk the inter-urban trail to a part of town, considered Old Bellingham, aka, Fairhaven. It’s about 1 mile to the path from our house, then another 2 miles on the trail, which travels right along the bay. 

First, eat pancakes.  Made with buttermilk by the hand’s of our man.  Butter melted and real maple syrup soaking in the yeasty goodness.

Like most mornings, we have our ritualistic dance party (since Mia does this in the nude, I will have to keep most of the good photos from ya’ll).  Not sure if Dada is bloated with impressions of Mama’s belly or showing the girls what it’s like when you eat a bit too much stuffing on Thanksgiving.  All I know is he can make his belly look big, but mine is big.

 We are finally ready to go.  This takes a long time.  The girls struggle with us about putting socks and shoes one, hats and coats.  These desert babies are not quite sure about all the layers.  It’s pretty funny, in Arizona they’d wake up and put on long undies, mittens and hats and want to go to the store dressed like that in the middle of July.  Here they try to wear their bathing suits out. 

Bye bye house.  

 

This is the few from my street.   Notice the awesome chicken coop in the yard of these folks.  Most of the time their chickens are just wandering around though.  Luckily we didn’t have the dogs with us; they are made for chicken torment.  It’s a pretty nice view of downtown Bellingham from up here where we live.  I love it at night, all sparkly, yet not a crazy sea of overwhelming sparkle like L.A. used to look like from the hills.  It’s just the right size.  Pretty soon I am going to be able to roll down the hill with this insanely large belly and I’ll need a truck to push me back up.

We stop at the co-op for a juice and some tea but forgot to take the camera out.   A few minutes later we near the bike path, but one of my favorite spot in town is the Community Bike Shop.  It’s like a bike grave yard, yet with endless potential of creating the ultimate bike for your specific crusin’ needs.  You just go there and pick out the pieces you want (double bike, triple bike..crazy carriers attached to the bike, you dream it up, you can create it there) and then someone will put it together for you.  I can just see us with a triple bike and baby in a some welded seat on the handlebars.  Watch out…

Finally we get on the path.  It’s a tunnel of green. Dying blackberry bramble and fluffy seed pods spread like seafoam atop ferms, which grow like feathery hair from the earth.  TIt’s vibrant and spooky and feminine.  The moisture feels so fertile, bursting with potential of pure  unadultered life.  For the first time I can sit still, breath, know my path is unfolding, just like this paved one.  I am in no rush.  As I wait, I just walk and observe.

 SOme views from the path…

This scenery may not mean a lot to some people.  I suppose this world is so beautiful and breathtaking that a lot of people get to wake up and see watery joy and brilliant landscape. I am not unique in this way.  And I suppose some people loved the urban desert’s landscape, too.  I think of my friends in Paris, Mailbu, Colorado, Wyoming, Hawaii and Thailand, and this could be a joke of beauty for them. But for me, this is quite a shift into haven.  I have been living in huge cities for the past 10 years, the last one being very hot and brown and it’s unplanned concrete sprawl nowhere near the ocean.  This new landscape is the change I needed,  I may take it for granted one day, but for now I give great thanks.  Less than 2 miles from my house, I am at the water looking at sailboats, talking with B about when we should get one, enjoying the salt air clean out my lungs.  I am in love and I am alive.

 

Our first stop is this cool park.  It’s playground is like a pirate ship and the girls love it.  Right next to it, hanging above the water, is a little coffeeshop.  We get them steamers with a bit of chocolate.  They run some energy out.

Coffee shop, which only gets a 4 on B’s 1-10 scale for tasty Americanos. He has a punch card for pretty much every indie coffee house in the city and likes to rate them on a scale.

 

 Finally we approach the bridge that takes us across and into Fairhaven. 

 There is this little beach right off the bridge that Mia loves.  There are some bay side boulders she can climb unto and feel her power; the sand is covered with soft and colorful sea glass and we fill our pockets.  And the wood sticking out of the water reminds her of her beloved movie, Surf’s Up.  She calls this spot The Bone Yard, and her adventures on this little piece of beach have been limitless.  I put the camera down to play with her here, there is no way I can forget how she turns into a fisherwoman- princess-pirate, lost in the Bone Yard, waiting for her father’s ship to come and find her….

 Here is a photo of the Bone Yard after we pass it.

We finally climb the pier and are almost in Fairhaven, ready for some lunch.  This shot is of big belly mama and her adoring firstborn.  I just can’t get over the belly. Now, keep in mind, I am layered a bit here and we are quite sure baby has been assuming Downward Dog or Warrior 3 pose in utero for the past week, so it does go down a bit here and there but all and all, it’s huge. Sticks straight out and is as solid as a rock.  Massive.  Big Bad Massive Belly.  Air horns sound when I walk past.  People jump out of the way.  And I am only 32 weeks.  Yikes.

DANCEBREAK.  Break dancing girls.

We finally enter Fairhaven.  It’s old, the buildings turn of the century, brick and full of that little city charm.  Full of good food, local shopping heaven and bookshops, it attracks people and the steets are sprinkled with Sunday walkers.  It’s a bit she-she, not as under-belly as Bellingham where I live; there are some shady characters wandering the streets (not scary shady, just shady) and if you squint your eyes past all the clean and green and political progressiveness, you’ll see a bit of grim (which I alway find sexy, can’t have anything too perfect or it’s a bore).  But Fairhaven is slightly different, real estate prices are higher, the storefronts obviously beckon a different socio-economic bracket.  There is a pet boutique there, get my drift?  Still, it’s a lovely place to wander on a Sunday.  Especially since most of the goods in the shops are made locally.  I just love that.

 And then we eat at Avenue Bread, where the bread melts in your mouth like butter.  I have tomato soup blended with cream and basil and garlic.  It fills us up, ready to head to the fabulous toy store right next to the cafe (which i have no photos of…I was busy playing!)

(notice the grease content of Mia’s hair in the above photo.  The night before my friend Kalayne did a belly cast on me.  The girls helped her of coure, and they certainly enjoyed the vaseline-like lube that was laying out, too.  Mia used it as hair gel and that shit just doesn’t come out.)

This one conked out right after the toystore.

Time to go home…

(disclaimer: this is totally and utterly unedited.  sorry.) 

 

I have gotten some of the nicest comments on my blog this week after I wrote that rant about the book I am reading.

 

I told you it was a really good piece.

 

It was a rant. But I can’t write anything else.  After I proclaim I am giving myself permission to be a writer and take the time, I have nothing to say.  I am as dried up as an old crone.

 

Well, just write something now. 

 

No.  Because If I write something now, it will just be to bitch about you and how I want to leave you.

 

So, go ahead.

 

No.  I don’t feel like it.  You aren’t that inspiring.

 

Want me to slap you for some inspiration?

 

No.

 

Want me to pinch your nipples?

 

No.

 

Dance around naked?

 

No.

 

Run down the street, dancing, naked, proclaiming my love for you?

 

No. (although that I would like to see.)

 

Dance around naked with a fruit cocktail?*

 

No. Gross.

 

And here, my friends.  This is what I am faced with.  Nothing to say and a husband who is annoying the shit outta me.

 

*to find out what a fruit cocktail is (in case you don’t know) rent Silence With Lambs.  The scene where that one crazy murderer dude (not Hannibal) is dancing, naked, in front of the mirror….and notice what he did with his private parts…that’s a fruit cocktail.  Yeah.  Gross.

 

An update on life.

 

 I would post photos but somewhere in the move I have lost the charger for my camera battery.  Nothing like having a fancy camera and can’t take pictures with it.  Especially on a day like today when the sun is pounding down light,  the air crisp but now cold, the water waves with light.  I become flooded with gratitude after 3 days of dreariness and then this gift of sunny brilliance.  When it is sunny here, it is beyond words of beauty. Perhaps the gift of here is that; to surrender with ease to the gray time and celebrate the lightness. I am so much more aware of myself with these daily shifts in weather.  I can’t believe I lived in a place where the weather change was so subtle it was work to notice it.  I lost my connection with nature a bit.  I feel it coming back.  I need the ups and downs.  Living under a spotlight of sun is a blessing, but there are times when I need to dark womb of reality to capture me allow me to gestate a bit. 

 

 Mia and her dad spent the day in outskirts of town picking up a cord of firewood.  Enough wood to last us the whole winter.  My dreams of cuddling with the new baby in front of the fire, sipping Pho broth and melting into bliss are coming true.  We have the fireplace.  The wood.  Now I can visualize where and how baby will be brought to me. 

 

We saw our new midwife today.  It was our second appointment.  I am breaking through the stress of not knowing her since the beginning of the pregnancy.  I can honestly say I really like her and trust her presence.  She is mellow and laid back.  Her hands our gentle and I could feel her conscious breath in and out while she pressed into my belly, carefully feeling for the baby.  Though in the back of my mind and heart, there is a part of me that wants her to show up right after the baby comes out.  Not that I don’t want her there, but then again, I may just want us there.  We’ll see how it all goes.  Until then, I feel safe with her and that is all I ask for.  What I admire in her is her balance and even personality. She rides a medium wave at all times, not getting jolted by the bigger ones. I think if I tree came crashing down and smashed through her window, she’d be the kind that wouldn’t even jump.  She’s just look over her shoulder and say, ‘wow, that’s some tree.” 

 

The baby had a heart murmur about 3 times during a three minute cycle with the Doppler.  I know this is normal and will easily go away but it brought up intense emotion for me.  I feel like baby was mirroring my heart right now; telling me it hurts and it needs to be opened.  That baby was saying, Mama, stretch your arms out wide, look up to the sun and roar like a lion.  Open your heart and let the fire burn through.

 

And so, even though Baby is going to be okay, Baby wants me to be okay. I can’t blame anyone for a closed heart, so I take this as my responsibility as my own. My husband cannot fix it.  My kids cannot fix it. A healer cannot fix it.  It is my heart, I made it.  I let it get closed somehow and so now it’s my journey to open it.  First I am trying to figure out why it feels so hard and closed.  Perhaps I have been in protection mode, trying not to feel so sad about leaving behind what I did love about the desert; those souls who linger there, those people who made me realize why I even stopped there for those three years.  Maybe my heart is closed because I don’t let my husband in, and I don’t see all the ways he tries.  Maybe it’s because I feel the stir of the Universe, this world and it’s pain; it’s full of suffering right now and there is no denying it.  I can’t live in ignorant bliss of war and poverty and children being made into slaves and killers.  I feel it right in my heart.  I am not separate from it.  Maybe it’s just closed from years and years of being me; tough, strong, intense.  Maybe I need to be vulnerable, finally.  Soft and mushy.  So I listen to baby’s heart go thump thump thump(…..)thump thump thump(…..)thump thump thump(…..) and so on.  That fourth beat,  missing.  Interesting that the heart resides in the fourth chakra and the fourth beat was missing.  I will listen to baby, work on opening that gushy redness of my center, open it up and let the love shine in.  And out. It is my new intention.  All else will follow.

 

Baby is also feet down.  All my kicks are way deep down in the pelvis.  Little feet kicking away.  But that’s all and good.  Head will be down soon enough.  Head down, chin to chest, spine facing mama’s belly.  Unless of course, Baby needs another way to get out here safely.  Of course, Baby, whatever way you need.

 

Mia had orientation at her new preschool today, The Loving Space.  It’s an old craftsman, restored in vibrant colors, a magical garden, kick-ass rope-bridges and climbing gear, a sand yard, lots of animals…and most of all love.   It’s a mixed soup combining Montessori, Steiner, Bev Bos, and Emilio Reggerio, but mostly they are rooted in the way of Love.  I like that.  They are also big on exploration.  It’s a place where kids can explore, get dirty and messy and be loud and get comfortable with themselves.  They have a loose schedule, but allow the child to do what the child needs to do at that given moment/day.  It always a child to feel power in their own feelings and choices.  My body really good there, much better than at the Waldorf in Phoenix or the Co-op school in Scottsdale.  Both lovely places, but each leaving me a bit unsettled every day that I dropped Mia off. At Loving Space, the smell of fresh bread is always in the air, paint is splattered everywhere, and a guinea pig waddles around the cozy carpeted reading and ‘quiet’ room.  This month the theme is community; so there are little stations set up around that foster that feeling.  Mia needs a place where she can experience herself without us.  This is hard for me to say, a homeshooler at heart.  But my mama intuition tells me to let my beautiful little bird go…time for her to fly.  Just 2 days a week, 4 hours a day.  For now.

 

 And Sula.  Little gift.  While dada and Mia were wood gathering, Sula and I were at the park, counting squirrels and sliding down slides.  We were playing chase, falling down in piles of leaves, laughing and tickling.  We walking and talking and looking out at the bay and trying to spot sea lions.  We were sitting in the Co-op drinking frothy steamers and eating pumpkin muffins and listening to a jazz duo play drums and keyboards.  I really look forward to the time I will have with Sula while Mia is in school and before baby comes.  Sula is truly is my gem, my mystery of the underworld; so peaceful and easy, so lovely and yet also so strong, dark and magical.  She holds her own and owns her light.  I learn from her all the time.  I look at her and wish I was like her; her deep set eyes and wide smile.  Her ability to just go “humph” and swing her arms down by her side when things ‘don’t go her way’.  She gets this life more than me, she tackles it and dances with it.  Her and I need each other and our solo time together is so rare. I asked her today, when the baby comes, who will I love? She replied as I hoped, Sula! Mia! And BABY! Yes.  So much love to go around.

 

And now I overcome with the urge to write a poem.  For my new one, turning all around me inside.  I think maybe baby just went sidewise.  That’s okay.  This one is for you baby (forgive me because I am certainly not a poet and don’t think I ever will be, but still, it’s for you.)

 

Baby

You make me

New and Big and fat

Ever expansive.

I grow and grow

Room for your

Colossal size

Beauty and dignity

Humor and magic

Valley wide spirit

Rock solid love

 

There’s no squeezing you

My insignifigantly

Small self

Had to widen

Every last part

To be filled

With such

Sensational

Grandness

Mountain Majesty

Spectacular as a star

No tiny spark of sun ray

But a sea

Of flaming sunshine.

 

 

You are strength

I have never known

And my fear

Of endless clothe diapers

Sinking in quicksand

Sleeplessness

Sore nipples

Ugly bras

Selflessness

Identity and body theft

Mothering too much

Too long

Is gone.

 

You have nothing to prove

You are already

Everything

all that is

And ever will be

I am all that is

Ever will be

And we will provide

Sleep

Support

Community

Guidance

Style

Time and space

An extraterrestrial

Cleaning service

The house will shine and

We will not be smothered

In duties and chores

And stress

But in pure

Easy

Easy

Easy

Love.

 

This

stubborn mama has

Crack wide open

Like an egg

Out pours

Golden light

Spilling and dripping

Illuminations

You have climbed inside

Navigated this light

From one place to the next

You have guided us

And we didn’t even know it

At the time

We listened

To you

And your subtle knockings

Whisperings

Of wisdoms

Of  wants.

 

 

Please excuse me

For looking at

photos of my ass

Snapped

Three months before

you were made.

Staring

In longing

and wonder

Will I ever again? Ever?

And forgive me

For only spending

A dollar on that pregnancy test

In May.

We were being cheap

In denial.

You deserved more

Than a dollar store test.

 

That same day

I am sorry for crying

A lifeless heap

On the bedroom floor

For hours 

While your dad

laid tiled

Pretending I did not

 Just say

Two lines.

We are sorry

And now we laugh

At our stupidity

Utter ignorance

Your divine presence

Is obvious

Looking through

The fog

We get it

We asked for you

Longed for you

Manifested the universes

Greatest blessing

You lifted us

Shared

Wise Wide

White wings

You whispered

Defy gravity, take flight.

And we did.

It was you

You

You

You

 

Don’t know your life plan

Or what the stars

Have in mind or in line

For you

But I will live it

Watching

Witnessing

Waiting to see

Where you will fly

Like a dove

Bringer of peace

In cosmic disorder

Of tribal rhythms

Union of all

Feminine and masculine

In one dance

In a new time

Breathing a new kind of air.

 

I do believe your charm and

Your glisten

Silly little grin

Will be all

Anyone ever needs

To grow and know

To desire

To follow this riddle

This mysterious

Ride in life.

You are a teacher.

No doubt.

 

But I will rewind

And come back

To this moment

This time

And I feel you right now

Poke and jab

And flip and flutter

And hiccup

And then sit perfectly still

Inside.

 

And I am captivated

By you

By your willingness

To be part of

Us.

 

I love you.

mama 

 

God damn her.

My hands throw her book onto the bathroom floor, over the high wall of my tub.  It lands, losing my place; pages filled with Italian Garamond font splay themselves out on the cold tiles.  I turn my head away in denial (and shame) that I just threw a book.  I stretch my leg out and reach my toes for the facet, which I use to turn off the hot stream, a combination of my big toe and the one that comes next, works perfectly.  I look down at my wide pregnant thighs. My round belly lays heavy on top of them.  My breasts lay heavy on my belly, the underside crease, sweaty and wet.  I take my hands and wipe away the moisture.  My nipples are not peach and small anymore; they are impassioned with brick-redness and large, preparing to feed another mouth, the third one. I take a deep breath.  I pathetically sigh, a helpless sigh of surrender to loss.

God damn her.

She wrote my book.

Or the book I should have written.  By now.

 *

Not that we have a ton in common and not that the content would even be remotely the same.  For instance, the demise of her marriage seemed to be catalyst for her search for self and belonging.  My marriage on the other hand only has only seasonal failure that, if I have recorded correctly, happens between November 12^th (my husband’s birthday) and ends around the beginning of the Judeo-Christian New Year.  This is the time when my husband loses his mind just a bit and settles in a murky and moody funk, self-doubt invades him and he undergoes contemplation about his entire fucking life This drives me mad, yet at the same time, I sympathize, I get it.  Although during this time we fail at being a truly “good partnership” and we become “let’s not touch or really talk for a while because we just piss each other off”.   But I get through it.  We both do.  He retreats to books of various types: esoteric to epic fiction.  I usually dive into hyper-attentive motherhood, so many arts and crafts projects that never actually get done and at night bottles of wine and copious amounts of pot (this year I am pregnant so minus the booze and drugs. This is unfortunate).  By doing this I blur out our temporary marital failure.  I finally figured out a few years back trying to help or sitting by and watching does nobody any good.  His metamorphosis is complete by January 5^th at the latest.  We join back forces and take on the world, connecting again. This is how it works. Or how we let it not work, until it works again.  So far it always has.

And unlike her I have dreamed of procreating and living in motherhood since I knew it was a choice I had, age four, maybe even younger.  It was never something I felt pressure over, never thought it was role I had to take on. Quite the contrary.  I waited and waited patiently until my life opened up to my first girl, the one I thought of and saw for years before she became a person.  I know that my longing for children and bringing them into this world was not done in vein but in following my heart.

And unlike her God my God isn’t magnificent.  My God is familiar and ordinary.  I never talk to my God in my mother-tongue, in request, asking for help or guidance (perhaps I should).  For some reason this feels wrong to me, like I am giving authority elsewhere.  I don’t believe in authority anywhere, especially when it comes to divinity. My God today has been a piece of toast from a local baker, warm butter, and spread lavishly with raw honey, all melty along side cup filled to the brim with a pacific northwest latte.  Whole milk.

Like her, the power of Sanskrit mantra and use of mala vibrates under the imprint of my skin energetically connecting our souls. Repetition becomes tangible magic for me.  I become intoxicated with gratitude and blessings when I chant in ancient tongue, fingering beads, 108, a mystic number, the same number of the chapters in her book.  And like her, I could very well find great pleasure in pressing my naked body up against Hot Italian Men, preferably two of them at a time, unrelated, of course. And how I am most like her, where her and I are bonded at the thick yet spacious marrow of our bones is in the  pilgrimage;  it carries my nomadic self much needed clarity, risks and discovery, the venture and movement fill me with vibrancy of owning both mine and world love, merging them as the same. I can feel myself in her feet, imprinting the global soil, eyes burning with observation and throat chakra illuminating with storytelling.  Like her, this is my selfish desire.  To move.  Watch. Listen. Write.

 *

My arms grab at the side of the tub and I lift myself up with a big grunt.  The water has gone away now and my body is covered with the small bumps of shiver.  There are only speckles of lavender seed from my face scrub scattered over the porcelain.  No doubt they will end up in the drain; eventually the accumulation will clog them.  B, now that we are in our time of seasonal marital crisis, will react gruff and annoyed that he has to get out the snake to unclog the old plumbing (any other time of course, he snakes drains with a smile, laughing at my ability to clog regardless if it’s because of my shit or herbal facial scrubs).  I step out of the tub wrap myself in the canary yellow towel that I stole from a hotel poolside last autumn.  I am glad I did since it’s the only one that covers my now 160 (or more) pounds of flesh.  I step right on the book, the one I threw and press it deeper into the floor, like I am pressing out a cigarette onto concrete. How could she?  How could she do this so well, so witty, so loveable and kind. Honest.

Almost thirty-four and I have no choice but to contemplate why I haven’t.  My mind should be on why I still haven’t unpacked half our boxes from the move,  but instead I search my entire body on why I haven’t been able to really write anything in this life yet,  something more than bits and pieces, scraps of memory or mirror.  The only reason I can come up with is also the greatest gift I have ever been given.  Motherhood.

Motherhood.  The initiation into a world of love so profound and exhaustion so heavy it covers me like the largest wave and there is no such thing as head above the water for a breather.  There is only finding comfort under all the weight, becoming weightless, learning to breathe with no oxygen and to function with the sleep still crusted in my eyes and my mind still scanning my dreams from the night before.

And at the same time it is the same thing that gives me powerful permission.  Permission to uncover my confidence, taller than anything I have seen stand on this earth and stronger than I ever was before I become a mom.  Motherhood has given me permission to always walk with my confidence wherever I go, not just to take it out here and there, in places of comfort, but to become my massive esteem at all times, everywhere.  I made life, birthed it and now keep it alive with love.  So do I give a shit what anybody really thinks me?  Am I intimidated by any situation?  Does it bother me that my clothes don’t match or there is food smudged on my face or that I may not be as pretty, or skinny or witty or smart or rich as the next person? Not in the least, not since I have become a mother.  Motherhood gives me the permission to truly know myself, which sometimes is hard to see as the self gets so lost in the process of mothering, but I am almost  forced to be myself; how could I be any other with my bloodline watching every move I make? They examine me and copy me and at times think they are just mere extensions of me, not seeing they are totally their own yet.   I want my children to know me and know that I reveal authenticity and seek my own truth at all times and possess who I am in every situation, never giving that power away.  Being witness to this; hopefully they will choose to try the same. 

And yet, simultaneously, motherhood has stolen the other thing I need to truly be myself: Time.  I have no time to exercise my nomadic legs that ache for movement, alone, without my family.  It has ripped up any passport or writing assignment or publishing contract to roam the earth while it rotates and I get devour the decadence of long-distance experience. It has erased hours each day to sit and think, to walk and breath alone, following the pattern of my steps, and then to light my candle in my red room of creativity and write.  Write.  Write until something good and true and right comes out of me.  This is at the center of my life’s comfort level, this lifestyle I speak of, and so my center remains uncomfortable, in a state of unease and waiting, a clock ticking.  It makes me jealous of those who get to live the writing life fully and with abandon to all else. I will admit that envy.  Because it’s about me, not them, at least I know that to be true.  It is about me.  And I am uncomfortable with the way things are.  Or aren’t.

My writing is squeezed into cramped and dusty corners of my days or nights, with little to no breathing space. For instance, these 2 pages of words have taken two evenings to write.  Not because I sit and ponder on how to arrange them.  There is no revision or edits, there is no spell check. Quite the contrary.  I am throwing them up, heaving them like they are the last words I will ever have time to share.  Tonight alone I have been interrupted at least 10 times and it is 11pm.  Granted, I began writing after the first attempt to bed them at 7:30pm, which is early for me to switch on this screen.  Usually my writing time is a post midnight after thought, like the backwash from the day. And tonight, I needed to write before one eye closed and half my mouth began to drool in a sleep induced state. When it happens like that, my writing is never valid or solid, and to put bluntly, it sucks.  At least it’s not what I crave it to be or what a reader might feel deeply.  Sometimes I succumb to being a mother who sits behind a computer during the day when I am awake (not the kind of mother I want to be) and I try to get it all out there while I have a smidgen of energy, while the kids are running and yelping around me.  Jumping on me.  Tickling me.  Begging me for things like help with pulling on socks or cutting apples or to read books or to smother them with kisses deserved attention.  And this is my life, how I want it to be, filled with them; and I am blessed.  But it does not make for a good writer. 

At when I get angry and I feel sorry for my lack of time or my situation I like to think of Raymond Carver.  I read once somewhere that he wrote his first book of short stories, locked in his car, while his abusive and drunken first wife threw empty whiskey bottles at him out the window of their trailer.  He wrote under those circumstances, not pleasant or easy.  And what about that other one?  Julia Cameron or Natalie Goldberg?  Single mom, unemployed and figured out how to write her first book, broke, while her small baby cried on her lap?  She did it. 

Perhaps my life is too easy.  I have no tragedy to pull through to the other side, no real pressing to say:  FUCK, I MUST DO THIS RIGHT NOW, or I CAN’T LIVE.  Right now all I need is to get through each day with gentleness and consciousness, keeping my kids at peace with this world, connecting them to it through ritual experience and trying to live in love with food in the refrigerator and a house full of whimsy and play.  There is no tragedy here.  Nothing has failed or is desperate, no painful falling to pieces and no serious need to lie on a bathroom floor and cry out to God for mercy and guidance, begging to please tell me what to do.  Like what she had to.  The one that wrote my book.

I don’t bother to comb my wet hair or brush my teeth. My body feels soft after the hot bath and I smother is in shea butter, wishing away any spread of stretch mark with oily massage.  I pick up the book under my foot and go out to the couch and read.  And read more.

*

Courtney is my dear soul mate, my friend from before kids and husbands.  She is a mother, writer, photographer, lawyer. She is from when we chopped off our own hair and died it different colors and took hits of ecstasy and wandered and traveled by ourselves to foreign land and danced endless evenings on crooked wooden floors in West Hollywood bungalows that barely stood erect on that tiny street behind the 4900 building on Sunset. She was from the time I would write and bind my own books and read what was inside them all over the city wearing thrift store skirts and doc marten boots.  Back in the days when I sat in small writing classes on living room floors and drank wine while Cathy Bates laughed at my piece about my feet, how they were beginning to look like my mothers.  Courtney knew me then, and knows me better now. 

So she must have known that the past 100 times the kids and I have went to the bookstore or the library in search of something to read, looking for the exact words, perfect in story and rhythm, beat and meter, so I could shot them up into my blood and change my life forever (because books do that to me) that I have left with none except another Dr. Seuss or Where The Wild Things Are or a new Harold and his purple crayon adventures.  By the time we are done lying around the floor of the kid’s section reading and playing, picking out my girls bound gifts, we are out of time.  Someone needs to sleep.  Or eat.  Or poop.  Or have a meltdown.  So we leave. 

So the other day I came home from the market, balancing a coffee in one hand and a bag in the other.  And on my step is a package.  And in that package was a gift from Courtney.  A book.  To be exact Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love was in the package.  And a note from Courtney:  I think you’ll appreciate this book.  Thinking of you warmly.  Much love.

She has no idea how much love I received from her.  Her intuition and gesture went deeper than just a mailed gift.   She sent me a muse.  This book made me angry at myself for seeing my limitation.  It angered me because I don’t explored my voice more, that I don’t always write with authenticity or raw truth, I skim details and hide from my dark side.  It made me angry that I don’t allow pain or failure enter my literary domain when it needs to.  Those things can bring movement and pleasure; to me and others.  This book made me angry for neglecting my talent, for accepting that I have no time and not insisting that time shift for me, change, expand limitlessly.  It has forced me to make the time, to demand it, to own it.  It is mine and I deserve it. 

This book represents the echo of my inner voice.  And though these words are hers and the experience will never be mine nor do I want it to be, I close my eyes upon myself and find inspiration and guidance.  It’s about a certain flow.  I am not there yet.  But now that time will be on my side, experience will be born (or my eyes will open to it) and words will find that flow with my new and improved consistent practice.  I am slowly changing my life story so that is becomes this.  A mother life.  Yet a writing life.  It is what always has meant to be.

I don’t damn Elizabeth Gilbert.  But it was fun to get so pissed off at a stranger.  I don’t long for my marriage to fail (as a matter of fact, I bet after reading this to my husband our seasonal failure will lift a bit early).  I don’t need to consciously invite dark and tight valleys, or regret, soul torture or sickness, in order to find my muse, I am lucky right now that my life is healthy and well.  I don’t ever want to flee motherhood to become something else or be somewhere else. I can fly around for now as an armchair traveler, yet I won’t I cannot live a moment longer without allowing myself the time for words, the real movement will come later, when responsibility loosens as it always does.  Although I will say my pregnancy hormones do take me to Italy, often, in grand fantasy, with Hot Italian men, definitely two at a time, bodies pressing. But I always come back home.

 

It’s a boy.  You are totally having a boy.  I am never wrong. E claims across the table which is covered with bowls of buttery chanterelle mushrooms, tossed field greens, roasted delicate squashes slightly caramelized with deep brown sugar and butter, all-spice rubbed pheasants and loafs of warm fresh bread.  The candles flicker between us.  Her bright blue eyes sparkle and dance, long black curls cascade down her wood-fire flushed checks. A boy.

Well, you’re not never wrong. Her husband sits next to her, a gentle reminder.

No, it’s a boy. E insists.

It’s always fun for me to hear the predictions of my baby’s sex.  I try not to jump too far into it, ignoring duality for right now.  Neither boy nor girl at this point for me, I like living in the oneness of it all. But I play with the conversation, sincerely enjoying why someone thinks inside is a boy.  Or not.

You know, this is the first time the thought of a having a boy doesn’t freak me out.  With the girls if someone insisted they were a boy I would get a lump in my throat and feel dread.  Now I am actually okay with it.  Nothing against boys…I smile.  Why do you think boy?

I can see him.  She gives me a beautiful, supportive grin.  In this moment I can feel this twirl of karma and connection.  After only an hour together, she is my friend.

Now this is the first time I have met E.  But I have heard stories of her for over seven years.  She is the oldest friend A, one of my dearest sisters, a woman I hold in the highest regard and on the most jeweled adorned pedestal. A has shared E’s adventures and journeys with me, telling stories of their time together from grade school on.  A always ends her stories with, God, you gotta meet her someday. Little did we know we’d end up living less than 2 miles from each other.  And although our paths have never crossed until this glistening forest night surrounded by a new Washington family and devouring this lovingly cooked feast, I feel like I have known her forever.  Outside the window I can almost see the shimmer of the beaver ponds that scatter around the house.  Astrud Gilberto sounds the air. Something beautiful is taking place.  Something always is.

Not just anybody can tell me they see my baby and I believe them.  But there is something, from spark to a fire, E ignites.  Regardless if Baby Dove is a boy or a girl, E feels him/her.  She sees baby’s light.   At this moment I am almost tempted to ask E if she will be at Baby’s birth.  Childless, yet I know she has begun thinking about the motherhood journey, I decide to wait to ask her.  My birth circle will form organically.

You should think of a name that starts with L. E looks are me dead on.

L?  Funny, I tried to convince B into Lennon for a stint.  Lion? Lyric? Ludicris? Liev? Leo?

Just as I was about to share my brainstorm of L names, I am overcome by pain.  Deep and inside, below the belly.  Tight.  Cramping pain.  It is so intense I breathe through it.  I slowly fade out of the conversation, petrified.  I am sliding down the leather dining chair,  my legs spreading toward the floor, holding my belly.  I breathe more and it fades, yet the lingering sensation of pain is apparent

Are you okay?

Yeah, Yeah. I smile. Gas.

I sit and pretend to listen for a bit, talks about having babies, raising babies, teaching children, growing local strains of mushrooms, and wine tasting all rush around me and stupidly I pretend to listen yet inside I am freaking out.  I experience at least three more of what seems to me like contractions in the next 15 minutes or so. These were not Braxton Hicks.  These hurt, cut like a knife, crushed like a vice.  Finally I spoke.

You know.  I might be having contractions.

K immediately went and grabbed me some water and asked me if I had been drinking enough today.

It’s a different thing, being here in the wet and chilly.  I am not constantly guzzling water.  Maybe not.  I drank up the glass she gave me and she got me 2 more that I gulped.  How long had it been since I drank some water?

I ached.  I felt a few more contractions, down low and in front, almost like a muscle ripor like my pants were digging knifes into my gut. Back labor is my past and not did I contract upfront for the girls. This was a new sensation. I took some more breaths and ate a little more food and put my feet up on B’s lap. Moments passed and the air cleared. Although the pains had subsided, something was still not right.  What was happening?  Was this baby telling me it was coming?  That my path was laid out and I would birth in a hospital?  A tiny premature baby taken from me and put NICU? What could Baby be? Three pounds? Why?  I needed to dig deep and feel this, this was no doubt a message from my body to my spirit. 

AD took me into the kitchen and placed her hands on my belly.  We talked of how I was feeling.  Like I am still ‘trying’ to get some place, still moving and not “getting it” that I have arrived, I have finally landed where my arrow was aimed since last April.. In the whirlwind of the past six months, working to get from one place to another I guess I haven’t been very conscious, not noticing that each transition, each step on this journey required a different velocity.  Movement got me here.  Now stillness and rest, long stretches, warm teas and laying on the couch and lifting my legs above my heart will sustain me and my baby while I settle in. I think I may have been moving like a wind-up toy that has hit the wall; its feet still moving with nowhere to go, stuck and in a rut.  This exhaustion and needless waste of energy has made me and Baby restless.  And as perfect as the body is, as wise as my baby is, I have been given a signal.  Those contractions were saying this: Stop.

 

 There is nothing much to do.  Boxes will slowly open and get emptied.  Walls will be hung with colors and memories from trips across the sea will be carefully placed upon the mantle. Drawers and cabinets will be filled and floors will be softened with throws.   Our new bed will finally be delivered. Baby’s things will emerge; the hammock, sheep skin, the warm cozy caps. Diapers will be gathered organized, separated into piles of hemp, cotton or wool. Tiny little clothes will be smoothed by my excited mama hands. As I sink into my newness and consciously live in this protected womb of a home, the visions of birth will unfold; they will rise up from the morning mist and they will stick like glue to these walls, imprinting a safe and gently arrival at a much later date, 7 more weeks, at least. This will all happen without rush or stress or pain. Everything can slow down now. We are here. We can wait with time to seep and move through, slowly, not in a fast line or a race to some end, but an enjoyable spiral, savoring this chapter  We may have to do a few things twice and take a bit longer or we might defy time altogether and fly up ahead.  We’ll twist with it and turn with it, flexible like a willow.  Time is not linear, there is no end, and I need to live that belief. I erase from my mind that I have a grid to follow and schedule to keep.  I can just be still now and watch. Sit for a bit. Breathe. Once again remind myself that I am not only phsycially home.  I am A Home for my baby inside.

 

Baby, rest with me.  Wait with me.  Sip with me the time we have while you are inside.  You are loved.  You are so love.