I've always been somewhat obsessed with memories. I used to keep a memory box with pieces of books I started in the sixth grade, newspaper clippings, and just odds and ends. Kind of like Scout in "To Kill a Mockingbird" but I had no Boo on the other side. And I was probably never that precocious or brave.
I know a woman who, in the past few years, suffered a very difficult loss. Her longtime partner passed away after a painful battle with cancer. They had built a life and routines around each other as comes with any commitment. And then, he was gone. Not unexpectedly, but painfully. And, I think, an uncertain world unfolded before her. At least that's what I imagine.
Not long after this happened, we were meeting in her space. I noticed that on her wall was a mirage of postcards, all of them very particular and lovely. I asked her about them, and she said she had picked them up with her boyfriend throughout their travels together. And that she looked at them to remember all of the wonderful places there were in the world to explore, and how many things she had seen. It was her pick-me-up. At the time, it seemed like such an obvious thing to do to "spruce up" an office. I thought--and think I even said--that I would make sure to buy a postcard during all my travels yet to come, and I would create a wall of my own that I could admire when I needed to. Making memories when I really needed them, in place of sunshine, beers outside at noon, and trains taken through landscapes that looked like Wisconsin, but were much further away.
We have traveled to Europe, Thailand, and New York since then. And at each place, as I promised I would, I bought a postcard, and have begun to create my own wall of memories. Yet, somehow, it has never done anything for me. It doesn't take me away. They're just nice pictures that I got somewhere else, and now they're here. Taking up a spot on my wall, but not opening a door to anything interesting.
The stories I have from those adventures are ones I share every day with my own partner in crime. And we talk a lot about the memories we have yet to make, the wines we have yet to taste, and scooters we have yet to crash. We're forever admiring the consistency of our life together, and making plans for life tomorrow. We take for granted the time we have, reminding ourselves that life is precious but never treating it as precious as we might if we thought it were fleeting.
This woman I know. I think maybe those postcards mean something more to her than mine do to me. Maybe a memory of something much greater than a place or a site. That makes her wall of postcards more beautiful than I could possibly imagine or hope to recreate. Nothing I own means that much to me. Nothing can compare to the gift of having time to make plans. And break them. I could live in an empty room forever, un-spruced. And instead, we'll open the door to the outside for as long as we are able.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
the doozer
This morning, I left the house at far too early an hour to head to my office under the auspices of making the final edits to my master's thesis. The tale of this work has its own series of twists and turns, and will certainly be the subject of another (or several) posts. But now is not the time for that. Now is the time for the doozer.
* * *
I have taken to drinking fully-caffeinated, full-fat coffees when I let myself indulge. And this morning, I knew I would need this comfort as a nestled down in my office to expand on the "Uncontrolled Epidemic," the dominate discourse emerging from press coverage of sex crime and sex offenders during the 1940s. That's my thesis. Bam.
Off to unnamed coffee shop. Fattest latte you have. Thank you. No, I don't want a scone. And yes, I'm having a fine day. Two women walk into the coffee shop, venturing the wrong way into the line. There's a very specific way in which one is supposed to get in line at this place, and these women started to crash it. Up went my heckles, ready to let them know what for. I hate bottlenecks. But they corrected themselves. Civilized, I thought.
I'm now at the little waity place at the end of the counter when one of the potentially line-budging women walks slowly and somewhat uncertainly to take her place behind me, so as not to disrupt the order of the coffee-waiting universe. And I recognize her. It's my fourth grade teacher: the doozer.
My folks sent my sister and I to Catholic school for two years. Never mind the fact that we are not, nor have we ever been, Catholic. But mom likes nuns. I went for third and fourth grade where I had the doozer. The doozer was also central to the music program at the school, so I can't think of a xylophone without thinking of her.
I should probably explain what a doozer is.
During my time in the fourth grade or then abouts, we watched a lot of Fraggle Rock at home. The fraggles: sweet, peaceful hippie muppets that lived in a symbiotic relationship with the doozers. The doozers: tiny construction-worker muppets who just liked to build for the sake of it. And the fraggles liked to eat what the doozers built, and the doozers were ok with this because they just wanted to keep building. So the fraggles would eat, and the doozers would build. And my parents, in the most affectionate of all intentions, called my teacher "the doozer" because of her resemblance to these mini things constructed of green felt.
So there was the doozer. With her partner. I remembered hearing that not long after I left the school, the doozer left, too. And I remember there being talk about her being gay, and about this having an impact on her decision to leave. Or on her leaving, anyway. I remember hearing that she cried when she talked to her classes about leaving. And, at the time, I remember not thinking or feeling much at all.
But there at the coffee shop, in about 30 seconds, I was overwhelmed by the sight of her. From my judgment of her as a line crasher to the rumored judgment of her at our school. From where I would be minutes later, working on my thesis, to where I was over 20 years earlier, in her class, singing about how the Lord would find me no matter where I went. Singing songs about the facets of a God I didn't understand and don't believe in. Not that way. She looked exactly the same.
I stopped her and asked her if she was a teacher. She said she used to be. I said she had been my fourth grade teacher, and gave her my name. She said she remembered me because of my hair. Her partner laughed with amazement, and said they hadn't been stopped in so long: "It used to happen all the time, but it hasn't happened in years." We chatted for a couple minutes about what we were up to (both still in education). I told her I was off to make some final edits to my master's thesis, feeling sheepish and nearly fraudulent, as though I should explain that I had been working on the same damn paper for nearly a decade.
Our coffees came and so did our time to part, as happens when the natural order of life interrupts perfectly good conversations. And she said, "Well...maybe I'll see you someday. You never know." And I felt an overwhelming surge of emotion. Truly, a desire to tell her how we had affectionately named her being after a sweet little muppet. But instead I said, "My parents really like you. We've talked about you over the years." And she smiled and said that was nice. And we said good-bye.
What's the meaning here. There is the one obvious thing: thank your teachers. Bless them. Praise them. They're not all good, to be sure. But the ones that are good are so because they care deeply and tremendously about helping people grow up to be ok in the world. So there's some meaning. And, of course, don't assume the worst. I feel pangs of horribleness when I think about how prepared I was to be nasty to the doozer for line-jumping. People are just people. Most of the time, anyway.
But there's another meaning here for me, I think. It's the sense that those people or moments that happen in life, around which you create memories, will arise again throughout your journey. The doozer has been part of the language of my crawl to adulthood, so it seems so logical that I would meet her again someday. Maybe even destined that it would be on the day that I was on my way to scribble out the last few words of something that has been so hard for me to finish. As though telling her it was going to happen meant that it had to, that I have to finish or I'll be lying. It makes me think of other bits of my life and how they will greet me in the days to come. I hope when they do, it's much like this. Something just perfect for the moment, to give me resounding perspective, however fleeting. I might even call it a glimpse of grace.
* * *
I have taken to drinking fully-caffeinated, full-fat coffees when I let myself indulge. And this morning, I knew I would need this comfort as a nestled down in my office to expand on the "Uncontrolled Epidemic," the dominate discourse emerging from press coverage of sex crime and sex offenders during the 1940s. That's my thesis. Bam.
Off to unnamed coffee shop. Fattest latte you have. Thank you. No, I don't want a scone. And yes, I'm having a fine day. Two women walk into the coffee shop, venturing the wrong way into the line. There's a very specific way in which one is supposed to get in line at this place, and these women started to crash it. Up went my heckles, ready to let them know what for. I hate bottlenecks. But they corrected themselves. Civilized, I thought.
I'm now at the little waity place at the end of the counter when one of the potentially line-budging women walks slowly and somewhat uncertainly to take her place behind me, so as not to disrupt the order of the coffee-waiting universe. And I recognize her. It's my fourth grade teacher: the doozer.
My folks sent my sister and I to Catholic school for two years. Never mind the fact that we are not, nor have we ever been, Catholic. But mom likes nuns. I went for third and fourth grade where I had the doozer. The doozer was also central to the music program at the school, so I can't think of a xylophone without thinking of her.
I should probably explain what a doozer is.
During my time in the fourth grade or then abouts, we watched a lot of Fraggle Rock at home. The fraggles: sweet, peaceful hippie muppets that lived in a symbiotic relationship with the doozers. The doozers: tiny construction-worker muppets who just liked to build for the sake of it. And the fraggles liked to eat what the doozers built, and the doozers were ok with this because they just wanted to keep building. So the fraggles would eat, and the doozers would build. And my parents, in the most affectionate of all intentions, called my teacher "the doozer" because of her resemblance to these mini things constructed of green felt.
So there was the doozer. With her partner. I remembered hearing that not long after I left the school, the doozer left, too. And I remember there being talk about her being gay, and about this having an impact on her decision to leave. Or on her leaving, anyway. I remember hearing that she cried when she talked to her classes about leaving. And, at the time, I remember not thinking or feeling much at all.
But there at the coffee shop, in about 30 seconds, I was overwhelmed by the sight of her. From my judgment of her as a line crasher to the rumored judgment of her at our school. From where I would be minutes later, working on my thesis, to where I was over 20 years earlier, in her class, singing about how the Lord would find me no matter where I went. Singing songs about the facets of a God I didn't understand and don't believe in. Not that way. She looked exactly the same.
I stopped her and asked her if she was a teacher. She said she used to be. I said she had been my fourth grade teacher, and gave her my name. She said she remembered me because of my hair. Her partner laughed with amazement, and said they hadn't been stopped in so long: "It used to happen all the time, but it hasn't happened in years." We chatted for a couple minutes about what we were up to (both still in education). I told her I was off to make some final edits to my master's thesis, feeling sheepish and nearly fraudulent, as though I should explain that I had been working on the same damn paper for nearly a decade.
Our coffees came and so did our time to part, as happens when the natural order of life interrupts perfectly good conversations. And she said, "Well...maybe I'll see you someday. You never know." And I felt an overwhelming surge of emotion. Truly, a desire to tell her how we had affectionately named her being after a sweet little muppet. But instead I said, "My parents really like you. We've talked about you over the years." And she smiled and said that was nice. And we said good-bye.
What's the meaning here. There is the one obvious thing: thank your teachers. Bless them. Praise them. They're not all good, to be sure. But the ones that are good are so because they care deeply and tremendously about helping people grow up to be ok in the world. So there's some meaning. And, of course, don't assume the worst. I feel pangs of horribleness when I think about how prepared I was to be nasty to the doozer for line-jumping. People are just people. Most of the time, anyway.
But there's another meaning here for me, I think. It's the sense that those people or moments that happen in life, around which you create memories, will arise again throughout your journey. The doozer has been part of the language of my crawl to adulthood, so it seems so logical that I would meet her again someday. Maybe even destined that it would be on the day that I was on my way to scribble out the last few words of something that has been so hard for me to finish. As though telling her it was going to happen meant that it had to, that I have to finish or I'll be lying. It makes me think of other bits of my life and how they will greet me in the days to come. I hope when they do, it's much like this. Something just perfect for the moment, to give me resounding perspective, however fleeting. I might even call it a glimpse of grace.
something to begin with
Today, I inched ever closer to finishing my thesis. Something I've been working on for quite awhile. During the duration of this work, many things have happened. I got married, bought a house, got my first real job, and gave birth to my daughter. Other things happened, too. Those nuances of life that are perhaps more interesting, and which are best saved for other entries. But since this is the start of something, I want to tell a story of my daughter's birth. Not the story, but a story of the day. A moment that culminated in what is the most beautiful, wonderful thing. And look, I went and spoiled the ending.
* * *
January 27, 2009. Her godfather's birthday. I hadn't slept well. Five days overdue and very much over going to work and hearing the "you're still here's" that are so easy to give and mean nothing. So, I stayed home. I had been having those wonderful contractions; you know something is happening, but the "what," exactly, is unclear.
I spent the day on my computer, legs crossed on the couch. Chatting and working and counting in-between pulses. It seemed to be every hour, and yet I was so sure that the time was far away. At noon, I put down my laptop and put on my headphones. Walking helps bring it all about, I had been told. So I decided to walk around my very small living room. Stella, my dog, was a little concerned. My pacing made her pace, so she went to sleep in the dining room. Poor thing.
First, "Tangled Up in Blue" by Bob Dylan. An amazing acoustic version that was first introduced to me on my 21st birthday on a mix from my best friend. It was nestled in there between Phish and Ben Harper, two artists who I don't really know much about, even to this day. But this version, Bob just strumming. A slower version of the one best known. I held my belly, so amazingly big. And we walked, the two of us. And I encouraged her to make her way.
Then "Such Great Heights," the Iron and Wine version. We swayed together; "Come down now." I cried openly and walked and danced with her. I hadn't talked to her that much until then. But in that moment, as that silent, sweet little song floated about us both, I felt as if I'd known her always and told her everything. All of my history and fears. The particular parts of myself that I keep on the inside. And in that now, I could ask her to make her way to me. We walked back and forth, not pacing but moving together in a loving cradle. We made a lullaby together, one that rocked us into union. It was so touching and private. Even now, writing this, it's hard to let the memory live someplace other than my heart. It's hard to not explain it enough.
Several hours later, she was born. Or came into the space where her father could see her, and other people who love her now could marvel at her grace. But we had already become mother and child, dancing in the living room inside each other. We had both been born together. And while every time I've had with her since then has been an unparalleled explosion of beauty, laughter, and insane sweetness, I do believe I have had no gift greater than those 4 minutes and 11 seconds on January 27.
Every time I hear that song, I think about leaving a me behind and entering the age of us.
* * *
January 27, 2009. Her godfather's birthday. I hadn't slept well. Five days overdue and very much over going to work and hearing the "you're still here's" that are so easy to give and mean nothing. So, I stayed home. I had been having those wonderful contractions; you know something is happening, but the "what," exactly, is unclear.
I spent the day on my computer, legs crossed on the couch. Chatting and working and counting in-between pulses. It seemed to be every hour, and yet I was so sure that the time was far away. At noon, I put down my laptop and put on my headphones. Walking helps bring it all about, I had been told. So I decided to walk around my very small living room. Stella, my dog, was a little concerned. My pacing made her pace, so she went to sleep in the dining room. Poor thing.
First, "Tangled Up in Blue" by Bob Dylan. An amazing acoustic version that was first introduced to me on my 21st birthday on a mix from my best friend. It was nestled in there between Phish and Ben Harper, two artists who I don't really know much about, even to this day. But this version, Bob just strumming. A slower version of the one best known. I held my belly, so amazingly big. And we walked, the two of us. And I encouraged her to make her way.
Then "Such Great Heights," the Iron and Wine version. We swayed together; "Come down now." I cried openly and walked and danced with her. I hadn't talked to her that much until then. But in that moment, as that silent, sweet little song floated about us both, I felt as if I'd known her always and told her everything. All of my history and fears. The particular parts of myself that I keep on the inside. And in that now, I could ask her to make her way to me. We walked back and forth, not pacing but moving together in a loving cradle. We made a lullaby together, one that rocked us into union. It was so touching and private. Even now, writing this, it's hard to let the memory live someplace other than my heart. It's hard to not explain it enough.
Several hours later, she was born. Or came into the space where her father could see her, and other people who love her now could marvel at her grace. But we had already become mother and child, dancing in the living room inside each other. We had both been born together. And while every time I've had with her since then has been an unparalleled explosion of beauty, laughter, and insane sweetness, I do believe I have had no gift greater than those 4 minutes and 11 seconds on January 27.
Every time I hear that song, I think about leaving a me behind and entering the age of us.
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