My brother Alec left NYC yesterday in a cab among swirls of rain blowing up the skirts of new York and bringing the spring, and the airports, to a chilly halt. It felt appropriate, after a weekend of walking and climbing and moving together through the colors of my life that look sometimes unfamiliar even to me, that he should leave just as he arrived – among irreverent uncertainty. Once he was gone, I resumed my life just as I had left it, answered my office phone and transplanting excel columns from one worksheet to another.
For most of this weekend I simply spent time with a good old friend of mine. Many times I took time to admire who this human being was, this person who I knew only as my brother, what kind of person he had grown into and the way that he managed to operate acceptably within society while (amazingly) always retaining authenticity in absolutely everything that he did. A few times did I recognize the person that I grew up with and a few times did I truly appreciate him as just one of the independent tree trunks that make up this larger moving organism of our family.
Tuesday evening, I went home late in the pouring rain. I mindlessly stuffed a teetering plastic bag full of clothes (in an effort to start the move from my apartment to the new one for a short five months), and I carried it over in the rain, peering around the side of it to see the sidewalk in front of me. When I got there, I folded everything and put it away into a dark empty closet. I decorated the house with my disheartened self in various places for a little while, before going into the bedroom to put a new blanket on the bed, finding soon after that the sheets were dirty and dusty from the room switch. This, clearly, was simply too much for me to bear. Or it seemed to be so, because five minutes later I was head first in my blanket, drawing my feet up so that no inch of skin would be exposed to the light. The next door neighbors children were racketing, yelling and throwing things against the wall and the new Jakob Dylan album (which I highly recommend) was playing to drown them out. Paralyzed by absolutely nothing at all except my own self, I stared at the inside of the blanket and started staving my oxygen, which I knew would run out shortly. I thought of everybody and their faces the way I remember them back at the house, at rainbow which will soon be sold, at family dinners and on walks, sitting on rocks up at betasso. And I thought of my brother Todd’s big birthday, which I would miss and which I would think of with every step along Park avenue this weekend. And I knew, with rich, colorful Africa beckoning to me with long, tugging fingers that time with my family over the next couple years might slip away underfoot like silt on the riverbanks of our lives.
Then I heard a random line in one of the Jakob Dylan songs, and it said something like “this is the place where you were born.” Before long I was irreparably weepy, and like a homesick child, refused to return to adulthood for at least three hours. In between bouts of tears, well past midnight and after I had removed my contacts, a gripping fear suddenly struck me – that one of the navy blue dresses I had piled on my bag of clothes had fallen off onto the ground in the rain on my way over. I didn’t remember putting it away, hanging it up or seeing it anywhere about our new apartment. It was most assuredly out there, underfoot and in the gutter – and my last memory of it forever would be wearing it this weekend with Alec in New York. Like a good old soldier, Buzz had his shoes and basketball shorts on and was out retracing my steps in the rain in search of it before another tear had time to reach my puffy eyes, rendered helpless without contact lenses. While he was out and I was groping desparately around the room with my hands for my dress without my “eyes in”, a strange thought struck me.
When it comes to family – is it actually your family that you inevitably lose to adulthood or just the way you remember them? Is loss a thing that is often just perceived simply because you forgot to put your wiser, more knowing eyes in?
Buzz returned empty-handed and I went to sleep without my dress and without any of my family around me.
When I woke up in the morning, I put my contacts in – which was a struggle because they were dirty and salty. Then, I walked in a sleepwalk to the closet and retrieved my navy dress from the crushing oblivion of several brighter colored, heavier winter sweaters.
My dress was there the whole time, out of sight and very much not out of mind.
When I got to work that morning, with a renewed sense of love and gratefulness in my heart for this family I had left behind two years ago and have had to fight for ever since against distance and cancer, I called united to change Buzz’ and I’s flights returning back from Colorado during our trip in June so that we could have one more precious day with the people I loved the most in the world. Alas. There were no more tickets available going from Denver to La Guardia on Tuesday, stated very matter of factly. Thwarted. Symbolic action representing the emotional commitment to/and the importance of my family squandered cruelly. Darkness, oblivion, crushing impossibility…LOSS. There was silence on the other line. Then a thought - “Is there anything going into Newark or JFK? (easier airports anyway)” The agent was friendly and the change was amazingly easy, we got the only two seats left.
Its funny what happens when you put your eyes in.
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Monday, October 12, 2009
Married with children: Sitcom or Epic Journey?
We went up to Poughkeepsie yesterday. The early morning train on a Sunday surprisingly full and the twinge of fall in the leaves just outside the city, turning more and more colorful as we got farther north. By the time the train pulled into Beacon, my trench coat and downtown accessories had become completely obsolete. After sleeping off the fuzz from the house party in Harlem the night before, I suddenly woke up in upstate new York – and Manhattan sounded more like another native-inspired train stop among the trees than the spitting city I lived in.
We had come to visit family, family he hadn’t seen in many many years. No one recognized the driveway at first, but we figured we were in the right spot based on the yard sale of children’s toys, plastic vehicles and cartoon reading material haphazardly decorating the entire space of the garage– apparently the garage was reserved for children’s parking— all adults must park outside in the driveway.
We let ourselves in and were immediately greeted by a warm, very full house, teeming with nearly 10 busy young children and their very friendly parents, potato chips in every room and walls stocked solid with family photos. Now this was a family who prioritized just that. Immediately after a few friendly introductions we were plopped down on a lengthy blue courderoy couch in a darkisk den with a heavy maroon carpet, laden with years of big and little feet, knees, snacks, playthings – the weight of many a lifetime, started and passed, day by day over its maroon fibers. A countdown to Christmas ticked over the mantle. After shaking hands with several of the sons-in-law, I took off my brand new navy blue trenchcoast and settled in next to them on the couch to watch the Bills game in florescent green light from the TV – not much need to get to know someone when you have football, I mean really.
The afternoon progressed as such – children crawling in and out, on laps and under chairs, being cooed and sometimes scolded, the adult conversation spoken in a tone half an octive underneath that which is used for the children so that all of us, big and small, know when we are being spoken to and what jokes are not intended for us. I ate half a bag of potato chips, not because I was that hungry but because they tasted so good eaten one at a time. If you eat potato chips fast they are too salty. Thus nothing like a Sunday afternoon to eat your potato chips slow.
Ultimately, we watched the Bills deliver their usual turnover in the last few minutes that led to their usual loss, followed by the usual heartbreak and banter between football fans. The sun was setting, the children were taking it up a notch taking turns crying, running, sharing and refusing to share with one another. If youre not used to kids you have to watch your step as they are almost always underfoot. Their worlds quite simple and never peaceful - remove an item they are interested in and they scream. Give it back to them they are quiet until they want something else and then they scream. Lesson - constantly look for alternative things they might be intersted in. They never really stop moving and when there are many of them, its like a relay race - one rests for a quarter second while playing with something and the others take their turn to run and laugh and tumble around the house. They are always the loudest when fighting over and item of mutual interest among them - apparently possessions and envy are two values that even the youngest of the human species can appreciate.
While the whole situation had me practically seeing spots and counting the seconds on the clock as it lorded over the afternoon, their parents remained relatively cheerful. They had learned to have pleasant conversations with each other that are frequently but not permanently interrupted by scolding or holding or shooing or beconing to or dressing or undressing a child – like doing a job interview while on another phone call, or shaving your legs and flossing your teeth at the same time, kind of thing. Parenting is clearly about patience, but also about negotiation, especially among more than three kids all with their own agenda– “everyone who is sitting in their seat at the table gets a juice box”. I truly think parenting might be the most admirable and noble career path, especially if you get a good ROI out of it in a few happy, healthy young adults if they grow up to be relatively normal and without any prominent social issues.
Eventually we made our way outside to the back yard, flanked by pleasant smelling smoke from the meat cooking on the enoumous BBQ. The sun was going down between the skinny yellowing trees and I heard nothing when I listened. We stood over by the covered pool, which was collecting dead leaves in a tiny puddle drooping in the center.
“Do you want a house like this?” He asked.
Ha do I want a house like this. I had to think about it. Do I want a life like this? Do I?
Part of me said yes – the trees, the smell of barbeque, the silence when you listen for it, being flanked by family who loves you above all others. The other part of me said, only if in this, I find more than a few pieces of myself. When you wake up in the morning and you hear nothing out the window, do you rummage among your dishes just to find some clatter to drown out the voice in your head? Or do you fall slowly back to sleep for 15 minutes, feeling the warmth of the person next to you knowing that you love that person more than every other person you have ever loved, and that really means something. The spouse and the children, do they fill your life with the racket you left behind when you left the city or do they give you a reason to live in the first place? Do they fill your life with doubt or with joy, or both?
Do you have to fight for each one of those big loves in your life in order to stay with it and know its price? Should I lose him first before I decide I just cant live with losing him? Should we meet with sickness, discomfort, all kinds of noise, messes, diapers and, heck, just the pure pain of childbirth in order to know how far we’d go to protect that little life we've helped create? Is it because we created it that we love it, or is it an inherent beauty of human living? Is that the magic of family – some if it you choose and some of it you don’t, but at the end of the day there is always football. What should I fight for, what should I wait for and what should I hope for when I picture myself in my future adulthood?
We boarded the train home in the dark. I tried to sleep but fitfully, clinging to his arm and wondering what time I would make it to sleep once we got home, what would I do when I grew up that I could be passionate about, and how much did he love me before returning to my previous ponderings of family, sacrifice and choices. As the orange lights of the Bronx and upper manhattan bounced off the black of the Hudson, all these questions would have to wait. I would fight hard for the loves that needed fighting for when they needed it – and I’d leave the rest for after my midlife crisis… a crisis that I had decided to push back (lovingly) by at least five years.
We had come to visit family, family he hadn’t seen in many many years. No one recognized the driveway at first, but we figured we were in the right spot based on the yard sale of children’s toys, plastic vehicles and cartoon reading material haphazardly decorating the entire space of the garage– apparently the garage was reserved for children’s parking— all adults must park outside in the driveway.
We let ourselves in and were immediately greeted by a warm, very full house, teeming with nearly 10 busy young children and their very friendly parents, potato chips in every room and walls stocked solid with family photos. Now this was a family who prioritized just that. Immediately after a few friendly introductions we were plopped down on a lengthy blue courderoy couch in a darkisk den with a heavy maroon carpet, laden with years of big and little feet, knees, snacks, playthings – the weight of many a lifetime, started and passed, day by day over its maroon fibers. A countdown to Christmas ticked over the mantle. After shaking hands with several of the sons-in-law, I took off my brand new navy blue trenchcoast and settled in next to them on the couch to watch the Bills game in florescent green light from the TV – not much need to get to know someone when you have football, I mean really.
The afternoon progressed as such – children crawling in and out, on laps and under chairs, being cooed and sometimes scolded, the adult conversation spoken in a tone half an octive underneath that which is used for the children so that all of us, big and small, know when we are being spoken to and what jokes are not intended for us. I ate half a bag of potato chips, not because I was that hungry but because they tasted so good eaten one at a time. If you eat potato chips fast they are too salty. Thus nothing like a Sunday afternoon to eat your potato chips slow.
Ultimately, we watched the Bills deliver their usual turnover in the last few minutes that led to their usual loss, followed by the usual heartbreak and banter between football fans. The sun was setting, the children were taking it up a notch taking turns crying, running, sharing and refusing to share with one another. If youre not used to kids you have to watch your step as they are almost always underfoot. Their worlds quite simple and never peaceful - remove an item they are interested in and they scream. Give it back to them they are quiet until they want something else and then they scream. Lesson - constantly look for alternative things they might be intersted in. They never really stop moving and when there are many of them, its like a relay race - one rests for a quarter second while playing with something and the others take their turn to run and laugh and tumble around the house. They are always the loudest when fighting over and item of mutual interest among them - apparently possessions and envy are two values that even the youngest of the human species can appreciate.
While the whole situation had me practically seeing spots and counting the seconds on the clock as it lorded over the afternoon, their parents remained relatively cheerful. They had learned to have pleasant conversations with each other that are frequently but not permanently interrupted by scolding or holding or shooing or beconing to or dressing or undressing a child – like doing a job interview while on another phone call, or shaving your legs and flossing your teeth at the same time, kind of thing. Parenting is clearly about patience, but also about negotiation, especially among more than three kids all with their own agenda– “everyone who is sitting in their seat at the table gets a juice box”. I truly think parenting might be the most admirable and noble career path, especially if you get a good ROI out of it in a few happy, healthy young adults if they grow up to be relatively normal and without any prominent social issues.
Eventually we made our way outside to the back yard, flanked by pleasant smelling smoke from the meat cooking on the enoumous BBQ. The sun was going down between the skinny yellowing trees and I heard nothing when I listened. We stood over by the covered pool, which was collecting dead leaves in a tiny puddle drooping in the center.
“Do you want a house like this?” He asked.
Ha do I want a house like this. I had to think about it. Do I want a life like this? Do I?
Part of me said yes – the trees, the smell of barbeque, the silence when you listen for it, being flanked by family who loves you above all others. The other part of me said, only if in this, I find more than a few pieces of myself. When you wake up in the morning and you hear nothing out the window, do you rummage among your dishes just to find some clatter to drown out the voice in your head? Or do you fall slowly back to sleep for 15 minutes, feeling the warmth of the person next to you knowing that you love that person more than every other person you have ever loved, and that really means something. The spouse and the children, do they fill your life with the racket you left behind when you left the city or do they give you a reason to live in the first place? Do they fill your life with doubt or with joy, or both?
Do you have to fight for each one of those big loves in your life in order to stay with it and know its price? Should I lose him first before I decide I just cant live with losing him? Should we meet with sickness, discomfort, all kinds of noise, messes, diapers and, heck, just the pure pain of childbirth in order to know how far we’d go to protect that little life we've helped create? Is it because we created it that we love it, or is it an inherent beauty of human living? Is that the magic of family – some if it you choose and some of it you don’t, but at the end of the day there is always football. What should I fight for, what should I wait for and what should I hope for when I picture myself in my future adulthood?
We boarded the train home in the dark. I tried to sleep but fitfully, clinging to his arm and wondering what time I would make it to sleep once we got home, what would I do when I grew up that I could be passionate about, and how much did he love me before returning to my previous ponderings of family, sacrifice and choices. As the orange lights of the Bronx and upper manhattan bounced off the black of the Hudson, all these questions would have to wait. I would fight hard for the loves that needed fighting for when they needed it – and I’d leave the rest for after my midlife crisis… a crisis that I had decided to push back (lovingly) by at least five years.
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