The space in between. In between two paper turkeys that hang on the wall from over a year ago. Above the kitchen table, many meals shared. The crows cawing loud today. What are you cawing about crow? September heat rot summer figs. Dried dark purple corpses, tears down the middle, reminiscence of pink and yellow juicy insides. The leaves on the fig tree so large now, they canopy the sand box, crisp dried fig leaves crunch under my feet. I walk to my green chair I put in the corner at the beginning of summer. I sit down, it’s cool here, the coolest place around. I wonder if I should put away the trucks for the winter? Will they deteriorate if I leave them out in the rain and wind? Should I put up new paper turkeys? These are baby paper turkeys, just dollops of paint, glue, brown and orange construction paper, and googly eyes. Jack and Fiona are three and a half now. Their Thanksgiving decorations this year will be more sophisticated. A few little baby paintings are still taped on the wall. Fiona is drawing “The Green Faced Man” now. Jack rode a scooter down the sidewalk this morning to school and stopped at all the driveways. Time that passes between is a growing time, a learning time. It’s hard to let it go, of the past three years, the baby phase. It slipped through my hands like sand in the sand box. The narrative was set, predetermined. The baby is born dependent on the caregivers, the child learns to be interdependent and become caregivers themselves. I never think about the time they spend away, in their communities without me. I think of them as they are with me. Fiona started helping a younger child we were with yesterday in a very mature way. I can only imagine she is a caring person on the outside. Jack likes talking to everyone. He looks older than he is and speaks clearly. He looks at people’s eyes when having a conversation. What’s happened in between the spaces here- two babies have grown into confident, individual children. Maybe it’s time for new paper turkeys.
Tag: babies
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It’s a hot summer day, we’ve been playing outside in the water, my night-shirt wet from sitting on the ground. Fiona has gone into the house, is standing on a chair pushing the button that turns on our speakers, but the music’s not on. She’s singing really loud and moving her shoulders and arms. I walk in the house, take off my top, and turn on some music, I flip through a few stations and when I get to teen beats both babies ears stand to attention. Fiona doesn’t have her hearing aids on, I turn the music up loud. The doors are open, they are filming a Netflix movie down at the park, I wonder if they can hear us. We all start dancing, Jack and Fiona run out onto the deck and back in again, I’m tempted, but I would be seen for sure, not that I really care. After the first song is over Jack says “More”. We listen to three more songs dancing away, arms, legs, bodies flowing with the beat, the Teen beat. The music’s not bad for this sort of thing. I’m enjoying this, my naked body four decades old dancing with babies, boobs bouncing, I catch a glimpse of my reflection on the glass door. My body looks pretty good, I watch myself dance, I started watching myself dance in Elementary school. I would pretend I was sick, stay home from school. After my mom and brother were gone I’d dress up and dance. I don’t know where I got the idea, but I loved doing it. In my twenties I went out dancing every chance I got, especially to REGGAE. I loved dancing, since getting married I haven’t gone to see music and dance very much. There’s been family parties where everyone started dancing, my body wouldn’t dance, it’s as if the dance was buried, like the words sometimes, or the creativity. A self-consciousness takes over. But as I’m dancing naked, my oldish body, bouncing boobs, in front of my two-and-a-half-year-old twins, as they dance naked with me I feel a freedom that I haven’t felt in a long time. I almost danced naked out on my deck, I can hear the neighbors now, “Mommy they’re naked” I heard this the other day as some neighbors walked by and Jack leaned up against the railing naked, pushed his body up against the railing as if he was showing them his willy or going to pee on them. I was laughing so hard, I guess I wanted to do the same thing today, then I thought what if we all just walked down to where they’re filming, naked, with shoes on only and hats. We’ll just sit and watch with the other neighbors like nothing is unusual. Tempting. I realized last night at dinner, having so much fun with my sister in law, great conversations, then seeing an artist friend I haven’t seen in forever, who I look up to, love her work, she tells me she was a teacher for seven years and it was the best, she loved it. If you can help one person, if you can make a difference in one person’s life, that is the theme. What I realized was we may not be able to change anything, the people with the guns and the anger and the hate will always win over peaceful people. I used to get mad when I saw people posting on Facebook to pray for Paris or pray for Orlando or Sandy Hook, or the Refugees from Syria, or the kids being shot in gang crossfire, praying won’t do anything I said. But now I get it, all we can do is pray. We can try to change laws and make the world a better place, but it seems like there’s fifty percent of any given population that wants guns, or are racist against this group or that, that aren’t peaceful people. I can’t change them. I can only be myself, I can only help myself, and maybe a few more along the way. I want to go to Pride today and dance naked in the streets of San Francisco.