Birthday

Leaning over the sink, I was crying and making food for a celebration of the birth of my youngest daughter Frances, who is three today. The tears were just flowing freely on the wave of emotion that was pressing up and out from my chest and throat, instigated by a favorite song, while I cut through plump strawberries and Dave busily cooked up a storm all around me. The girls were in the next room enjoying the treat of a weekend movie, and I was overcome with joy just thinking about her birth and what a gift she is. Three years old and she is the funniest person I know. The moment that was coming back to me as I sliced fruit for the party that would start very shortly was the moment when I first held her, immediately after she left my body and entered the world. "Remember how beautiful she was?" I asked Dave, my face wet and smiling. "Yup" he answered, throwing sliced scallion onto a pizza he was designing. I fell into the vivid memory of her beginning. She was stunning. She was so full of being herself. The most amazing thing about watching children grow into themselves is the fact that they are who they are from the moment they are born. Life is just a process of growing into who we really are. Who we have always been. That's it.

Back to the Garden

So I was driving along the freeway in Los Angeles where I live, and amidst all the concrete I was thinking about lack. The lack of green around me. Then I noticed all the trees along the sides of the road and some huge Eucalyptus that I have always loved, came into view. I was thinking about my garden and how excited I was to plant it and also afraid because I have always thought I lacked a "green thumb." But I took the plunge and planted a garden last spring and was thrilled to watch it grow and produce food. I planted it with a lot of intention of becoming an urban farmer who grows and trades produce with her neighbors. But instead I found myself looking at the many bean and squash plants that never really made it, like a failure. I wasn't looking at the corn that had grown or the tomatoes that were exploding around me, I was just looking at the things that were dying or dead. (My attraction to morbidity follows me everywhere.) I was worried that the corn wasn't getting enough sun because the plants weren't tall. I had aphids.

Finally it dawned on me that all was well in the garden. A friend had drummed it into my head that "your garden is a reflection of you," and I realized that if I was fine, so was my garden. The point is to be with it, wherever it is. To be with the ones that are dying and to recognize that as part of learning and part of life. The feeling of something lacking disappeared as I decided to be grateful for the plants that are flourishing. But most of all to see it for what it is, to appreciate what it has taught me and to make changes accordingly. Plant the corn on the other side next year, and give the pumpkins more room, for instance. But mostly just be with what is. As long as there is growth, nothing is lacking. This morning for breakfast I had a bowl of tomatoes with basil from the garden. MMmmmmm! Thank you garden!!

Spider rhyme

Now I have a pet spider

I guess she belongs to me

She was laying on cement

Under my favorite tree

At first I was afraid

And poked her with a stick

Then tried to pick her up

When her legs started to kick

I knew that she was gone

It must be a reflex

I took her in my studio

And laid her on my desk

I drew her with a pencil

Dark shadows made her fierce

Immortalized her body

On paper it was pierced

A week later when I touched her

Her legs moved again!

And again I reasoned reflexes

And put away my pen

But tonight I flipped her over

To draw her corpse once more

And this time it was clear

She had yet to cross death’s door

When right side up she is still

Appears to be dead as can be

But when she’s on her back

Her life is plain to see

Can a spider last this long?

Can she go for days and days

Without water to sustain her

Or flies caught in her maze?

Perhaps I’m a chosen witness

To her last days of life

As I have been to others

Into death I am midwife

She moves her legs in rhythm

In sleepy peaceful time

And I watch her in this place

And carry her with this rhyme

First Day

First day of school for me and both girls. Leaving Grace in her new classroom in a new school was harder than I anticipated. Even spending the morning with Frances at her first day of preschool was a little heart-wrenching. I kept thinking about the trajectory of her educational life, just beginning. Had to have a good cry in the middle somewhere, God only knows what for. Shall I continue to hold onto the fear and nervousness I felt on my first day of school now? For God’s sake, I had my last day of school over sixteen years ago! Although Grace was great and expressed her nervousness openly, I recognized the look of anguish on her face as she said goodbye. I immediately went to that place with her, felt the feeling of what it’s like to say good bye to Mom in a strange new environment. But does it do her any good for me to go there with her? Doesn't it serve both of us a little better when I can separate the two? Somehow acknowledge her feelings, knowing from experience what it's like, but leave out the piece where I actually feel her pain? Because in that moment I know I'm not really being her mother. I am being her. And she doesn’t need that. She needs me.