for the last two years my sons muddled along in search of articulate and eloquent sentences. and then they met Dora.
"let's make a drawbridge!"
"I have an excellent idea!"
"the sun is going to set without delay"
"oh no, my Miffy is stuck in a rut!"
he's back. unashamedly outlining the beauty and the foundations of our family. packing us with boundless love. and ending the full-time domesticity of my life.
eye infection. Will. bouts of migraine. me. depression and prominent licking of anal area. Finn. Mommy I want. Sean. messy. house. the severities of an unpredictable job. husband. blank page agony. me. invading. Tarzan 2, the Teletubbies, Maisy and Dora the Explorer. piling up. laundry. home in two days. husband. dry cracked lips and tire around waist. me. ear infection not healed after 7 days of antibiotics. Sean. thank God for the dishwasher. me. thank God for everything. still working on it me.
single-parent day #18.
need I say more?
it's been a day of erratic thinking. whimsicalities. and Disney movies watching. and going Christmas shopping, alone, again, merely disrupted my perfected melancholy. I squeezed through crowded sidewalks and narrow alleys trying to ignore the suffocating familiarity of buildings, streets and even people. and for the first time in years, I wished I were somewhere else. exhaustion, loneliness, doubt, I wish I could explain my lassitude but every excuse I come up with is completely irrelevant.
"Mommy!"
"what?"
"smell my feet!"
love enfolds as my little boy laughs hysterically. and his innocence fondles my tormented soul.
oh how I love him.
sometimes our reflection in the mirror is the only palpable evidence of my being a mother. a momentary halt in a path worn through my life by too much precipitation and too many questions. like. I love both my children. some days my heart threatens to burst with all the love it contains. but lately I like one more than the other. and it ravages me. because it does not feel right. because I'm afraid. he finds out.
"Mommy, when I am big I can be a magician?"
"yes Will, you can be whatever your little heart wishes to"
"and I can drive your car!"
the air is saturated with conspicuous lighting and anonymous carol songs. I know this is supposed to be the most enchanting time of the year. but I guess every day grappling with domestic duties and bath water drinking toddlers is not the most effective way to illuminate my soul with sweet Christmas euphoria. I'm back to single-parenting mode. late night television and bad eating habits. the uneventfulness of my daily life gravitating around my two offsprings. but I've learned something important today.
I rock at Christmas gifts wrapping.
I was in utter surprise. M&M's lunch boxes, truffles from Godiva and Winnie the Pooh pasta. the boys buzzing with compulsive elation. of course, he's here for only one day. of course, I have to wash his socks. but the scent of his unexpected presence appeases the multitude of conflicting emotions that were balking my existence lately. like butter to my bread. sharpening my senses. atoning for my faults. making life delectable again.
until he leaves for another 10 days.
but for now he's here. he's home.
yesterday. the sheer and pleasurable euphoria of buying a new skirt and sweater. and 30% off. an afternoon with fabulous friends. white chocolate and raspberry muffins. homemade. and cheese. a day without the boys is brief, fleeting yet never too short. I know. I am a bundle of paradox. but I did miss sandwiching between them early in the morning. I missed my sons.
today. pernicious germs have pervaded my house, wrapping and sealing momsterland in a package of mess, confusion and anarchy. I smell like puke and vanish carpet oxy. and I swing back and forth "I am cranky" and "I am grateful" like a pendulum. I worry, I rationalize. sometimes, there's just too much going on in my head and I can't decide. it's time to be alert again. to corrupt the medical secretary. to miss a couple of days of school. it's time to remember to pay the cable bill. it's time to absorb. the whining. the vomiting. the crying. to dedicate, to give. to love.
Dec 19, 2005