Purple and pink. Burnt umber and grey. Who can tell what is real or dream? Last night in a dream I walked in tall grass. It scratched my legs. Today I walked through the same grass. Little white bugs flew up but never touched me. Fiona called them flies. “Mommy” she whined. “Flies are getting on my horsy”. I walk back through the flies and tall grass. A bit of asphalt on the ground catches my eye, I hadn’t noticed it the first time I passed this spot. The area intrigues me. Old remnants of structure, of road that used to be here. A strange brown bridge Jack, Fiona, and Valentina sit on. It’s old pieces of round, dark brown, wood, it almost looks like tree branches. It’s scratchy and splintery. It goes to nowhere over nothing, as if it were transplanted from a place it belonged. “Fiona, your horsey loves grass.” I say. She got a new play horse yesterday, she loves it. Memories flood me, being a kid, playing with my horses in the grass, pretending they were eating and I was going on a ride. I imagined what I did and did what I imagined. In nature. Under the sun, the dirt, red ants biting my butt, stepping on nails, getting tetanus shots. Bugs and beetles and pollywogs. Frogs and snakes and old barns, old trailer campers. Vacant rose greenhouses where the sun shines through the broken fiberglass roof and roses still bloom. We rode our ponies through, feeling what was, feeling what the space is for us. A vacation. A dream world with real spiders and scary stories. Purple and burnt umber. Pink and white. These are the colors I chose to paint with today. It was a good, productive day in my studio. Painted in my notebooks. Pulled apart tons of pages that have stuck together leaving scars. Leaving repairs to be done. Structure. But it went well. Realized I have a lot of pages to finish in my gargantuan notebook before my show this fall. I can do it. I take deep breaths throughout the day. I stay connected. I cocoon when I need to. I got what I needed today.
Category: self awareness
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A fly buzzes up and down the inside of the window, a weed blower just broke a perfect silence, the babies are down for their nap, it’s 2:25 on Thursday afternoon. I would love to have a nice hot cup of coffee, but I have to compromise with herbal tea or I’ll be up all night. Today Jack, Fiona, and I went and got our flu shots. We had to wait quite a while, the babies started getting restless and wanted out of the stroller. The waiting room had chairs and soft benches they wanted to sit on. I finally gave in and started reading a story, “A Duck on a Bike”. Surprisingly I had Jack and Fiona’s complete attention and corporation. As I was reading the book I felt a little silly, with my silly voice, then another little girl and her mom came over and listened to me reading the book. All three kids were happy as pie. The other little girl was a little older so I could engage with her more than I can with jack and Fiona. It was cool and embarrassing all at the same time. My silly voice. We go into a room, which is set up for Code Blue, with cardiac kits and supplies for resuscitation. I thought of my mom, re-lived the hospital room, the last moments of her life, as I tried to keep Jack and Fiona busy enough to think we were doing something fun. The nurse comes in, Jack had opened a drawer with supplies, a little yellow tag fell off,
“Did you do that?’ she asks me.
“Umm, I’m not sure, I think Jack may have opened a drawer, is it bad?”
“Yes”
“Sorry, jack we’re in trouble”
Whoops, well I’m doing the best I can. It’s challenging with two two year olds in a situation like this. They are curious. The nurse gives me my shot first, the needle is big.
“Look, mommies getting her shot, then you’ll get yours” I tell them with a smile on my face.
It hurts just a touch and then I don’t feel anything. The babies get their shots, they cry a little, but then they must not feel any pain anymore either because they get over it quickly.
They were good babies today.
Yesterday I had my first GAP collaboration session with Carl Heyward and Alvaro Sanchez. It was so fun, we made some really cool collabs. I was nervous and wondered how it would go, but I felt immediately engaged and connected to both artists. I’m really excited about GAP and working on projects with artists from around the world. I started working in a couple new books today for our GAP collab project. We’ve got a bunch started now, we’re passing them around so everyone has a chance to work in them. As I opened one of the books, it is the first book I didn’t start, meaning it already had information and mark making from other GAP artists. It felt like I was peeking into someone’s secret book. I looked through some of the pages and notes, I felt a personal connection. I wanted to know more about who wrote the notes, made the marks, what day it was, where were they? What state of mind were they in? It also made me think of street art in the way that I am covering up, reworking, adding to something someone else made. It agrees with me, this process, the way I work and think.
Today when I worked in my studio on my “Nap time paintings” I worked on some collab and a few of “Just me” and noticed a difference in the way I looked at/ worked on/ made decisions on my “Own” pieces. It is really interesting. I learn so much about painting by working on collab. I also feel like I can work more freely on my own stuff, like there’s a healthy detachment, or I can look at it from a very un- self-critical way, more than ever before.
I’m starting to hear Jack and Fiona waking up from their nap. Time to get back to work as mom.
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Boiled carrots with butter and salmon stuffed crab, that’s what I’m cooking for the babies and me to eat. They are taking a long nap now. I don’t think they’ll be totally into it, but I figure if they’re hungry enough they’ll at least give it a try. I have some leftover pasta and meatballs I can heat up as back up. The day is cloudy and quiet. It’s nice and cool, which I can really appreciate, I think I’m going through perimenopause, my body has been fluctuating between hot and sweaty then cold on what seems like an hourly schedule. I no longer feel confident that I am dressing Jack and Fiona correctly for the temperature, my fear is definitely underdressing. I know this will pass like it always does, until I hit the big one, menopause. I don’t know what I’ll do then!
We went to Early Start today. Thursdays we have parents group and the babies stay with the teachers in the classroom. It really feels like a break for me even though it’s only an hour and a half. Today there were only two of us and the therapist for most of the time. I brought up my dilemma I wrote about yesterday, when I’m super tired and I have a nanny. I feel guilty if I don’t work in my studio or take care of chores around the house. The therapist said to look at it as a choice, I choose to lay down and do nothing. She suggested taking note of my feelings and using them as information, not fighting them or my body’s needs. It was very helpful and comforting that the other parent in the group has the same guilty feelings when she does nothing when her son is taking a nap.
When I returned home, after Jack busted his lip on the stairs, they always get hurt right before nap time. After I made them bottles and put them in their cribs, feeling guilty for still giving them bottles at seventeen months. After I did my short Yoga video to stretch out my super sore legs from the insane exercise class I did yesterday, I thought about the birth of Jack and Fiona. I thought about how uncomfortable I get when people ask me “how was your delivery?” Because it’s such a long story, and I didn’t carry the babies. It’s also uncomfortable because the delivery was traumatic. The nursery was ready, we had supplies, diapers and onesies, which were all too large for Jack and Fiona. We had our car seats and bags packed. When I first thought about using a surrogate I just couldn’t understand. I kept asking, “So when the babies are born the surrogates just going to hand them to us?” I asked this question over and over again. The whole nine months I felt connected to Jack, Fiona, and Malissa, but at the same time I felt distant, like I could still run away if I felt like I couldn’t handle my new life. I didn’t even think the babies would survive. I kept thinking they would die, or one would definitely die. We got to the hospital, three hours away, it was 9:00A.M., the doctor had induced Malissa at 6:00AM. She looked good and we all smiled nervous smiles and had nervous conversations. We realized after the doctor came in several times that it was going to take a while before Jack or Fiona would make an appearance.
I wished I could have carried my own babies. But I would have been a wreck and I know it doesn’t make a difference once they are born. I quickly became mom and I know our bond is just as strong. The doctor broke Jacks sac first, I can’t remember what time, but he stayed in for what felt like too long and I was so worried he would die without the amniotic fluid. Soon the delivery room was packed, Alan and I at the top of the bed. I said I didn’t mind not seeing the head come out. I felt like I was going to pass out any second. There were nurses, people with oxygen, two doctors, an intern doctor, and Tom, Malissa’s husband. Jack came out first, Alan cut the umbilical cord, Malissa was in pain and her heart rate was sky high, she looked pale, I was worried and so was Tom. The nurse lay Jack on the little bed under the heat lamp. His legs and arms were so small, I kept asking “is he O.K.?” The nurse kept saying “Yes, he’s perfect.” I didn’t believe her, “he’s so small” I kept saying. Little Jack. The doctors were waiting for Fiona, they broke her sac and when the doctor put his hand up to grab her he said she swam the other direction. The floor was getting more and more blood and fluids on it. I only had socks on and didn’t want to step on blood. The doctor finally got Fiona out, she looked white and limp, legs black. I thought she was dead. They sucked out tons of fluid, then gave her oxygen. It took several minutes for her to start looking alive. Alan and I went to our room, took off our shirts, and laid down on our hospital beds. Jack was put on my chest and Fiona was put on Alan’s chest. We stayed like this all night, and pretty much for the next three days. I was worried about Malissa, but the nurse said she was doing fine.
Now it’s almost seventeen months later. We are in the process of transitioning to one nap and giving up the bottle. But people still ask about the birth and Moms still like to tell their birthing stories to me. It’s a very powerful moment when something is born. Last night I was watching the babies play and thinking about how much they know, but also how much they have left to learn.
Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes 