A day of touching sadness. Touching and not turning away. No running. Stopping the (in my head) conversations before they ran wild. Breathing through. Leaning in. Moist eyes easily disguised as water from the bright sun. Squinting down the hill, feeling the heavy mask of sadness as I board the bus. As I flip through a magazine in the waiting room.
The list of what I want grows longer and longer. Adding every day. Someone to help change the crib sheets. The surprise of an empty kitchen sink. A grilled steak. Snapped back to the moment by dancing descent of yellow leaves as they catch the sun like coals from a fire and glitter on-off on-off on-off like fireflies but in the blue blue sky of this day. And I wonder about my list for OWL. What do I want for him? Health. Nourishment. Knowledge. Confidence. Love & happiness. Fearlessness. At home with himself. To see me happy and…. I don’t even finish the thought in words. Funny, how that inserts itself into every nook & cranny, every list, every hope & fear. Almost a year and I am still not comfortable. This feels a mess. Divorce. Foreclosure. Unemployment. Living in the land where it seems like everyone is either married or gay. Or 23. Flying solo. Wandering the trails, OWL in pack, while friends hunker down for family time. Cooking 3 meals a day and at least 2 snacks. No yoga.
But I also know that we are all very lucky. No one is being beaten. Or overfed like the sad 14-month old giant I saw on the bus this afternoon. Or underfed. We never worry about where to sleep. OWL is surrounded, blanketed, by love and acceptance and encouragement. He learns. Absorbs like a sponge. He watches and imitates and acts. He is bold. Independent. A snuggler. I talk to his father often. The three of us have polite family lunches where OWL is the star, even though I am at a slight distance.
But lucky because things could be worse does not always cut it. Today it doesn’t calm the sting of the sadness. But it doesn’t pin me to the floor me either. I look at it and see my fears and hopes for what they really are. Alone is scary. Terrifying even. Mama & OWL do not fit the definition of family I never even knew that I carry so very deeply. The presence of absence surrounds me, not him. Because what I want for him is to have my definition of family right here, in our apartment, and this alternative version we have reflects that I cannot give him everything I want. Whether it’s for him or me or for us, I am not enough. Today, touching that sadness, not turning away and leaning in, I begin to see that this okay. It may even be good news. A relief. I grant myself permission to not be everything.
Looking at OWL through this broken heart, I am learning that I truly have nothing to do with who he is, and yet everything to do with nurturing that being and opening the space for him to flourish. Introduce him to the world. Watch him try new things and have the wisdom to let him fall sometimes. The compassion to wipe away tears, blow on “ouies,” and hold him to my chest when he just needs to scream it off. And looking at myself through this broken heart, I start seeing the wisdom in a cooling sheet of fresh-baked cookies next to our dinner plates full of tofu, kale, potatoes & corn. Seeing and tasting and smelling the fruits of our family night. Permission to redefine it all by looking honestly below the surface and leaning in. And in those moments of squinting damp eyes and aching, joy joins the sadness as I begin to understand that everything I need, I already have.
Travels with OWL 