Day 45. 10 small moments

1. Still on Pacific Standard Time. I sleep in and think of the possibility of “re-entry” as a never ending condition.

2. “NO!! Momma sits next to ME!!!” …Part of me, the dark and wanting Demeter side of me, revels in this summoning lament.

3. The frantic chaos of the morning rush before school. I didn’t miss it. Not one bit.

4. We drive around to the north to scout out locations. We go to places we’ve driven by before (but now with a slightly more focused lens of what we might need). The autumn cold creeps in, but the sun is shining and Wisconsin looks beautiful in this weather. He looks beautiful too.

5. I burst into tears in our company’s conference room after a meeting about the future. We are not on the same page! …my rage. rage. rage… I take a deep breath. We work through all of these thoughts and differences. Together, we pick at each word (and the context in which each word is manipulated) like anthropologists trying to understand the big picture of “what devastation caused all this?” The final promises before we part for the rest of the day is that I love him. And he loves me. That is enough, always, even so.

6. Lunch with a new friend. I order beets and lots of veggies, and I immediately miss California — of feeling nurtured with food and the care of strangers. I tell her about my time with the circle of women, and what a metamorphosis in perspective it brings: the empowerment and vulnerability; the community and sisterhood. I’m hungry for all those feelings again.

7. Piano with him is super stressful. I want him to simply love it — but there is nothing “simple” about my expectations. There is nothing simple in the idea and ambiguous requirements I have placed upon him and myself as a mother who “simply wants him to love it.” The irony and complexity of the dynamic and dysfunction is not lost on me. But still I stumble over the tropes and pitfalls of motherhood.

8. I sit in the car for ten minutes before going in and joining everyone to collect my thoughts and emotions.

9. BE GENTLE TO YOURSELF! (I heard this mantra all of last week, and still I had momentarily misplaced the reminder).

10. We could have eaten dinner and talked with them for another five hours. Cheers to friendship and conversation, both silly and deep.