Beach, Music, and Home

Rachel and I drove to Virginia for her biannual Sandbridge Hammered Dulcimer Week. For those outside the HD world, this is the place where a very particular people dispel their excessive enthusiasm for the instrument by playing together 33.2 hours a day times 5.

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This is also the place where my red-headed child drags me out of bed in the early mornings for walks on the beach so she can obsessively search for sea glass, interesting shells and half-dead or dead creatures that she carefully carries back to the water hoping to save.

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She occasionally makes it back to our room just before supper and plays a song for me on her back up hammered dulcimer in our room. (Because she hauled TWO hds to Virginia and she is not tired of making music).

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After one late night jam, she returns to our room, gets ready for bed and in her southern voice says, “I’m gonna spread out like a MAAN. And crack open a BEER.” Then she takes a swig of her “beer” (Coke), swishes it in her mouth and gets choked.

It is a good week. But a long one away from home.

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HOME

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HOME

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HOME

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HOME

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HOME.

The place where they DON’T water your plants when you are gone.

Incompatible

Awakened by your quaking and shaking,

I give you a sleepy, irritated kick.

The bed instantly stills.

I drift beside your warmth.

A false peace —

residual giggles vibrate our bed

and disrupt my sleep again

and again.

Finally, I sit up

“I’m going to pee and when I come back, you had better be done with this nonsense.”

Which triggers another round of bed shaking.

How inconvenient that you dream in Dr. Seuss, rhymes and all, when I am least interested in laughing.

Don’t know much and learning

I turned 50 this year. My body is tired. I grieve for the could-have-beens, the should-have-beens. I am disappointed by what I’ve learned about people I loved and respected.

But the exhaustion, grief and disappointment are invitations that I’ve been accepting again and again.

To attend a new party, to gather a new people, to do what brings me joy though it may appear illogical or a waste to others.

And I am learning how much I did not understand about myself and my place in the world. I am learning that I love learning new things and new people. I love learning what I didn’t know before.

I am learning ….

• how necessary good counseling is to mental health

• new insights into my life partner

• how to play with my young adult kids

• how important it is to spend time with friends who like and respect me

• what resurrection really means

• that I really do need to read and write and walk every day

• that I am not weak because I have an autoimmune disorder and I don’t need to apologize or hide for my choices related to that condition

• that I am smart and capable of making good decisions in hard circumstances

• And I love recording what brings me life on my little blog. No one needs to read it but me. I am enough.

So I turned 50 this year, and I feel so thankful for this body that has carried so much, I am thankful for the grief that propels me to write a different story and I am thankful for the disappointment that forces me to build more life-giving relationships.

Thirty Years

Doing all the things

Settled in the couch corner with my laptop and working through my to-do list — schedule Rachel’s orthodontist appointment, research a new Spanish curriculum for the girls, order the next violin book for —

“Mama, I just want to snuggle,” Prairie says, plopping down next to me and curling close.  She chats about her hair, aerial silks, the dog, her sinus headache…

Back to my list — I search for mattresses which the boys will need for college next month —

“Mama, can you rub my shoulder right here.  It hurts.”  I move my computer from my lap and turn to dig my fingers deep into Lincoln’s muscle.

Next on my list — pay the credit card —

Rachel settles beside me without a word, waiting for me to look at her.  I glance up, knowing I will see her smile, the one that says “I want you to pay attention to me but I don’t want to ask you to pay attention to me.”  Her back is conveniently located within my hand’s reach.  Just in case I should feel like giving her a scratch.

Soon after, I run up the stairs to change clothes.  I have 5 minutes to get ready for a 3 o’clock meeting in town.  “Mama,” says Sidney, catching me midway up the stairs, “I have a video to show you.  I think it will make you smile.”

I think about my to-do list.  I should start every day’s list with “Focused, in-the-moment, attention to each child.”

Lest I forget … while they do need me to be a responsible adult who pays the bills, schedules their dental needs, plan for their education … they need hugs, an attentive ear, massaging fingers, an interested eye, and a scratching hand more.  They need all the things that say “Love.”

Or maybe my to-do list can be squashed to one word — mothering.