In Sweetness

But the pause. There breathes the truth. There, we live for the hope of it all.

The tree was aflame. Up close the leaves were burnt, rusted, coated in confused fall mildew, but in the glow of the rising light, they twittered with color. A still breeze trembled their tips, making the flames dance. 

There is absolutely nothing unique or pretty about this yard, in fact the opposite might be true, but this tree stood in majesty. I want to live in moments as magically as this tree exists in the morning sun.

I was listening to Briefly Perfectly Human on my dog walk, and my heart was cracking open under the gentle weight of Alua’s words. You will never be younger than you are right now. This is the oldest you have ever been. We are who we are in the pause, the present, between this thing and that thing, the stimulus and the reaction. The stimulus is the world. The reaction is who the world tells us to be, how to behave. A bundle of shoulds and bullshit. But the pause. There breathes the truth. There, we live for the hope of it all.

My mom is moving to the Berkshires. There are a million things that might render that statement untrue, but right now, it’s more of a fact than an idea. It was always going to be someday, she said on the phone in a panic, and what she means is that part of her never thought it would actually happen. It’s happening. We have four real estate agents. Two here and two in Texas. We have a shared financial advisor, crunching numbers. I went to an open house on a Wednesday and peeked into a stranger’s private space, drawers and closets and pantries bearing witness to a life. Who are they? Who have they been? Who will they be? If my mom lives here, in their wake, who will she become?

Somedays come when you really want them to, I said in reply. I was standing in the sun on a cracked sidewalk, listening to her think on the other end of the line. Say yes, knocked my heart.

I’ve realized something recently. I want my mom to move here. This amazes many people. Are you sure?, they ask, skeptical and protective. It makes no sense and also all the sense in the world. I keep thinking about how I’ve been away from Texas for 18 years. In that time, I’ve seen my mother 20 times, give or take. She just turned 70. Am I ok with only another one to two dozen visits before the inevitable? Of course we never know the number, do we?

Alua says we are dying every day. The sun rises. We do the things we do. It sets. And that day has died. Our cells are another 24 hours older. Our bodies, our minds, our spirits, all the parts of us that make the whole can only march in one direction. 

I just had a thought. I googled Mary Oliver’s oft-quoted The Summer Day:

Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

Remarkable. I took this photo only a few days ago in what I am calling Confused Fall. It’s like the poem visited me, paused in my palm.

So I’ve been thinking a lot about death. It’s been following me. (Does she ever follow you?) And it’s not only the loss of my father and brother, my beloved cats, my aunt. Of course that matters. I carry their names as scars on my heart. Rather it’s the unknown chapter that tickles my curiosity. What comes next? I do not need to know until I do. But until then, I wonder. 

Thinking of my own mortality is easier than pondering the mortality of my loved ones.

My brother keeps waving hello. His name is a brand, a symbol, a font. I see him in the silliest places and I love it. I think he’s having fun. I am reminded of us running like deer through Texas fields, facing off garden spiders the circumference of dinner plates. Baby bunnies in our palms, coaxed to eat soggy lettuce. He followed me everywhere and I ache that I failed to lead him into safety. Do you remember the movie Radio Flyer? As a child all I could think is that I am not brave enough. I could never run away. A first failure. Maybe it would not have made a difference, but it is a regret I will carry with me forever, that I did not try.

That movie was criticized for suggesting that flights of childish fancy are an anecdote to abuse. I think these critics must have lived different childhoods. Our minds were all we had, our own private rabbit holes down which to tumble, to escape, to salve over our wounds with salty imagination, painful but better than nothing. It’s true. We lacked a magic wagon to soar either of us out of reach of swinging fists, though I think we’d have both taken the beatings over the hurtled words, the spearing insults. One of my earliest memories is being called stupid, an asshole. I say these things to myself still, an echo of those early-laid neurological pathways. I have to catch myself. Snatch the bullet midair. Do not speak this way to yourself, love. You are a precious thing.

I’ve started working part-time for Project Sage, a domestic violence agency. It’s hard, mostly because my time and energy is limited, but it feels right. A homecoming of sorts. I have also been making paper flowers. I need to work with my hands. I need to engage my senses so that I do not float away into the ether. So I make bread. I gather seeds. I cuddle my dogs, pressing my face into their ears, their necks, inhaling their scents. I stretch my body into shapes that are both ecstasy and pain. I mold Italian crepe paper into petals, hot gluing them to wire twisted in floral tape. This too feels like coming home. My first job, while I was in college, was as a sign painter and florist. I hated the customers but loved the flowers. I want to tattoo blossoms across my body. I want to finger the flesh of blooms, press them to my nose, and inhale deeply and forever. Higher and higher. Wilder and lighter. In sweetness.

What is it that you crave? Give in. Our time is precious and oh, so very, very short.