 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
For as long as I can remember, I've been able to dream myself out of nightmares. My subconscious and I... we have a pact. I pay attention when it speaks and in turn it declines to press the point once it's made. But now... now I have nightmares I can't wake from. A couple of months after the baby was born I put her in the baby carrier, nestled against my chest with her face resting on my collarbone, and went to the chocolate shop. The curb leading up to the door is very steep. I misjudged it. Completely. For the first time in my adult life, I fell. Not just tripped. Fell. Both of my feet left the ground. There was no time to acknowledge there was nothing I could do. A two-month-old baby landing on a concrete edge with 140 pounds on top of her was not going to survive, and it didn't matter that I didn't have time to brake my fall. We stopped. I was on my knees. My right palm was flat against the ground. My left was wrapped around her, cradling her head... which was less than a foot from the ground, the length of my bent arm. She didn't even blink. When I looked down at her she was staring at the world with mild curiosity, unperturbed. And I, I shoved myself upright, stepped up onto the curb and walked into the chocolate shop. I shook while I drank, and the heat of the chocolate scalded my scraped palm through the paper cup. I could feel the bruises spreading on my knees. Once upon a time, I'd thought vanity would be enough to spur me to exercise regularly. It was... for a while. But it never kept me at it, day after day. Running until my ribs feel like curved knives. Lunging with sword, point-out, my legs burning and arm trembling from exhaustion. Biking uphill, pollen stinging my eyes. When vanity wasn't enough, I thought it was over. The only thing that could possibly motivate me, I thought then, was the romance of a cause. But what cause could possibly obtain, in a modern world? I was never like to be the heroine of any story. More fool I. To be quick enough to dive for her. To be strong enough to hold her. To be fast enough to race her. All my nightmares are of her coming to harm. I know inevitably she will. But if it is in me to prevent it, I don't want my body stopping me. So I run for her. And as my heart expands and I feel the love of those around me, I run for them. For all of the people I have failed to understand need me. Need me to be strong. To be healthy. To live and laugh alongside them for as many years as my heart will beat. I don't think the mother's nightmares will ever go away... but then, my duty won't either. So I no longer try to dream my way free of them. The point has to be made, again and again and again. When I wake I lean forward and rest my brow on my arm, and then I renew my resolve. Live now. Pay attention. Grow strong.
Grow strong.Tags: health, life, mom in spots, philosophy
Current Mood: quiet
Current Music: Gabriel & Dresden - Dangerous Power
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Unless she's totally exhausted or very hungry, Wigglet will smile at everyone. And if they smile back, she will smile harder, wiggle and sometimes giggle. Thus, one of my favorite things to do now when I have the energy is to toss her in the car and go... somewhere. Anywhere. As long as there's people. I will hang her in her baby-carrier facing outward and wander around, and she'll look at people and beam at them and they'll light up like lamps. I've only run into one or two people so far who can't smile at a baby who's smiling at them. I'm sure these are the same people who are grinches at Christmas. Sunday the baby turned six months old; Monday I took her to the doctor for her check-up and her first shots (she's fine). While I was there waiting for them to come back with the immunizations, I bounced her on my knees and thought, "Wow, I've been a mother for half a year... when did that happen?" Because I don't feel any different. I caught a glimpse of my silhouette in a darkened store window walking back to the car a couple weeks ago, and I don't look any different either. I'm still within the same 30-pound range I've been all my adult life. I've had silver hair since I was 16. I've basically dressed in t-shirts and jeans for years. ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) hyanan tells me being a mother has made me change for the better. I've certainly learned a great deal, very very quickly. And all those things they say about the smile of a child and the laughter of children and the trust of your sons and daughters... all that's true. I don't need to tell you again. If you're a parent you know it already; if you're not, you won't get it. I certainly didn't. But what no one told me, and what I find interesting most of all, is that children teach you that you're not the center of the world. I love taking the baby out and watching her make people smile and knowing that I'm not the one who made them happy. I'm not the most important person in the world. I'm not the only person in the world. I don't have to be perfect. I don't have to be "on" all the time. Sometimes, things really aren't about you. At all. And... that's a relief. Part of the peace of letting go and knowing one day you, too will be dust... is understanding that. You can know it intellectually, but nothing teaches your heart that lesson like being a parent. Now if only I could get some sleep around here.... Stardancer Home.Tags: life, mom in spots
Current Mood: quiet
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
For various reasons, Baby Wigglet hasn't been sleeping through the night, so I'm only managing maybe two hours of fencing a week, less than I want. Plus, last week was rather demoralizing because the three adults who usually show up for group practice didn't. I was surrounded by energetic, athletic and aggressive teenaged boys and girls. Let me tell you, there's nothing like having a little Asian girl—who's still taller than you—giving you pitying looks because your short legs don't let you lunge as far as her to make you feel old and decrepit. Anyway, hyanan's offered to teach me iaido, so I took her up on it and we started this weekend. While I often feel like an inadequate mother (no matter how many times people assure me otherwise), I have to believe I get cool points for entertaining the baby while practicing cutting up a rival daimyo's samurai on my lanai. Wigglet sat in her blue chair and chewed on her tiny stuffed whale toy and was quiet throughout, so it must have been interesting to watch. After that we packed her up and went to get food and groceries while still dressed in practice outfits (this is the point where I note that hakama look much better on guys). I joked while we were walking through the frozen section that we were like some bad intersection of an anime series and a cheesy 80s movie ("Two Samurai and a Baby!"). hyanan rolled her eyes, maybe, but she's used to me by now. Poor woman. I have by now forgotten almost all the nuances of my first lesson and am left only with some bizarre specifics, such as the belief that if I don't hide my thumbs some ninja will come cut them off. But I find that there are a lot of similarities between fencing and iaido, at the fundamental level: there's a shared emphasis in balance and its seat in your hips, in the notion of threat and implied threat, and in the emphasis on situational awareness. Learning is the same also, in that both instructors echo each other: "Do it slow and learn it well, speed will come later." When I think about what I'm learning from all this, I keep coming back to one thing: I need to write more fight scenes. No, wait, that's not it. What I'm really learning is that in high school I should have joined the fencing club, because that's were all the athletic boys who were still into knights and dragons and geekstuff were. No, that's not it either. (Though I'll share that bit of wisdom with my daughter when she's old enough.) Um, when I figure out what I've learned, I'll share it with you. Count on that. Just keep your thumbs tucked in or you'll have to use base eight. Stardancer Home.Tags: fencing, health, iaido, mom in spots
Current Mood: loopy
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
"Okay," I say. "More practice talking!" The baby watches me from the swing, intent, leaning forward. "Baby," I say. "Mommy. Daddy. Doggie!" She grins. I grin back. "Again?" A giggle. "Baby-Mommy-Daddy-Doggie!" And then I say, "Let's sing that, okay?" So I sing it to her while she listens, eager. And then, when I get to the end, I go backwards. Doggie, Daddy, Mommy, Baby. "Why don't we do the family?" I tell her, and she waves her arms. I sing again, spiralling outward in order of how often she sees them. "Baby, Mommy, Daddy, Doggie, Grandma, Mota, Papo, Papi!" And then backwards again, ravelling the family back to the heart. Twice more I do this. Then I say, "How about the extended family?" And then I begin again. Her immediate family, her grandparents, her aunts, her uncles, her cousins. And then backwards again. I realize: I am not the last person in the chain anymore. As I sing the generations, I see all the people who came before her, some already gone to dust; I wonder at all the people who will come after her. And I pray, I pray there will be more so she can sit in front of them and string the men and women on the chain like pearls, one after another, so she can see herself in context, one more generation between the past and tomorrow... ...just like me... I am crying as I sing and I don't remember when I started. "Doggie. Daddy." I pick her up. "Mommy." She laughs and touches my salt-wet mouth. "Baby." Stardancer Home.Tags: life, mom in spots
Current Mood: ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
This morning, I was holding a print of "Ghost" in my hands and cackling because it looks like something out of a Thomas Kinkade gallery. And then I realized... it looks like something out of a Thomas Kinkade gallery. Not in the "it's a colorful painting of a cottage with pink and blue lighting" sense. In the high fidelity "will last longer than the person who buys it" archival "hang it in a museum/gallery" sense. And then my head exploded. The long-term fans who watch trends will have noticed that I used to do a lot of marketing of my prints. I went to conventions, had a nice separate website for them, had sales, did matting, had quasi-limited editions, did the whole online auction thing. And then... I stopped talking so much about it, until these days, if you know I have prints for sale it's probably because I've mentioned it in a desultory, "I'm having a sale!" way, once a year. There's a reason for that: setting up to do fine art reproduction is time-consuming and costly, and spending several hours to make $10 wasn't at all compelling. What can you buy with $10 today? You'd be lucky if that got you lunch at a cheap restaurant. And that was when my time was cheap. You know, in college? I had no idea how free I was. I could spend time like air. Then I got a job, but even then I was free. Working full-time I still could goof off and play World of Warcraft a couple of hours a night while still writing a novel a year and painting two or three things a month. Now... I steal time from every available corner, in one or two minute increments. I'm doing it now to write this, while eating and keeping an eye on the baby. I can't game if I still want to draw. I can't read if I still want to write. Right now, every moment is precious, because when I collapse around 10 PM, I'm done. There's no more work in me. And I think about how my father quietly told me once, "We wanted to make sure both of you had a college education and a servicable car before you left home," and I know my minimum standards for my daughter aren't going to be any cheaper. So I look at this thing in my hands then and wonder, "What am I thinking? Look at this thing! Look at how much time it takes me to paint, scan, color-correct, test-print and print it! I need to drive somewhere to buy the paper. I need to drive somewhere to mail it. How many hours of my life does this represent when I literally count my free time in minutes now?" --ten minutes, quick, paint a couple more lines--five minutes, quick, edit one of the Admonishments, one minute, quick, jot down some notes or a thumbnail for the next project--Pricing my art used to be part ego, part philosophy and all abstractions. But now... now it's precious. Every minute I spend on it. My life has changed. If I'm going to do this... I can't low-ball it for fun anymore. Not because I don't want to. But because I literally can't afford to. Stardancer Home.Tags: art, life, marketing, mom in spots, news, technology
Current Mood: !
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The baby is sleeping, so I'm drowsing in bed next to the baby monitor... pondering whether I have enough energy to get up or if I should just lie here until she wakes. Leaning in favor of 'just lying here.' And then the baby monitor lights up. "....aaaaarrooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! " I stare at it, wide-eyed. What-the-heck-barbecue-- "...RROOOOOooOOOOOOOO!" Pause for breath. " Awp-awp-aaahROOOOOOOOOOOoooOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" And then I remember when I left the dog was sleeping next to the baby's crib. She's definitely not sleeping anymore! Talk about sounds you don't expect to come out of a baby monitor... Definitely time to get out of bed! Stardancer Home.Tags: humor, life, mom in spots
Current Mood: amused
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Previous
tired
