diminishing

Every morning as I wake

swimming with dreams

wrestling with the dark

our world is ready to stack

before me, crisp towers

of lists and leftovers 

from the night behind me

and so I enter the strange 

thing that is the day 

like an all-you-can-eat buffet 

the return of my appetite 

some bright miracle

Pic: MSU's spirit rock in honor of the Iranian women's protests. The highschoolers walking out over Virginia governor Youngkin's anti-trans policies, a lunch-time walk-and-talk with AK, my capstone students brilliantly knitting news with readings... I am grateful for decency and beauty showing up in this world.

(peek)

I'm not ready for what people call "peak colors" and "peak fall" yet, but this tiny peek is okay by me. I've kinda missed the outdoors.

I haven't been on any long treks recently. L, who's the person with whom I've hiked the most in the last three years, was quite sick with Covid and I couldn't bear to be on any of our usual paths without her.

However, Big A (my second-best in this regard) was here on another 36-hour visit today, so we went for 'a full Sparty' at a very brisk pace and solved all our summer problems (theoretically at least)!

Pic: The Red Cedar with hints of yellow and red in the bordering foliage. 

"what-ifs" and wistfulness

From the beautiful pictures on my FB feed, it would seem that it was homecoming weekend AND ALSO national daughters' day. I thoroughly marveled and appreciated at all the kids I used to know looking radiant and lovely and quite grownup. But I was also plagued with some "what-ifs" and wistfulness. 

I'm going to take this moment to acknowledge my feelings...then I'm going to let them go as gently as a pebble into water... and let the ripples rise and close up in calm.

Quiet

Scout and Huck are worried for me... because I play this harp so badly. 🤣😂 They would prefer me to be quiet.

It was otherwise a quiet and fulfilling Sunday: UU meditation, a hang with JL at the Lebanese coffee shop, a chat with my sis and mom, a WhatsApp celebration with the cousins, weekend chores, a soak, groceries, dinner with all four kids, teaching prep, Navaratri invitations and menu-planning, a heart-warming chat with At while I dropped him back at his place, more teaching prep, and so to bed.
 

yesterday's sunshine

yesterday's sunshine listens to me

guessing at laughter or at grief

yes, the kids are playing again

but no, they've not forgotten

yesterday's sunshine reminds me

I should live wildly--as if I can

erase distance, ease today's rain

warns me beacon-like: enjoy

"I saw the sign(s)"

A midday stroll with JG today and this was her front yard when I drove up--a veritable forest of election lawn signs! It includes at least two of our colleagues from work too. As always a lovely chat and I left feeling loved and full of ideas.

Back home lots of hangout time with Big A whose "Boss Day" it is and whom we'll have to  return to the train station and thence to Milwaukee Saturday morning. 

All these trips to the train station really remind me of residency days when Big A worked at Bellevue and I'd put two kids in the car to pick him up at the Summit train station. Seven-year-old At used to call those trips "midnight adventures." 

Now here we are again 16 years later, thanks to the magic of there somehow being 25 Emergency Medicine residencies in MI and only 2 in WI. We've come up with a plan (wish?) to renegotiate his contract for the next academic year... And although all of it is a long ways off, it's a hopeful sign on the horizon. 
 

drop

The temperature dropped suddenly (and punctually for the autumn equinox) today. So here's me in blankets and puppies, by the heater in the study, trying to get teaching prep for tomorrow done before I get to PICK BIG A UP FROM THE TRAIN STATION!!

I don't know if it's silly to pine for one's partner at this stage in my life, but it also feels basic--you know? One should get to end every day with the person you picked for life.

*three thoughts *on the third day *of the work week

*Lots going on in the world outside and students were on fire today, discussing--the Hijab protests in Iran, the Venezuelans trafficked to Martha's Vineyard, the floods in Pakistan and Puerto Rico... 

*I felt buoyed today by an internet friend becoming a more IRL friend, work friends finding non work ways to connect, and my sister's glee that her birthday is "just four months away."

*When I need to laugh, I come back to this picture of "Kangaroo Huck" with her feet rudely positioned on Scout's butt, her "dress" askew, looking at me for pets. 

look up

I had to run an errand on the far side of town and found myself getting dejected by it as I always do... the houses seem to be falling down a bit more than normal, the cars seem rustier and noisier...

And I say this as someone who lives in a house whose roof has leaked for at least three years and has not been fixed although roof-work started [... and stopped] at the beginning of summer and as someone who drove a car with a busted-up headlight for nearly six months this year after my 'deer incident' as there were no replacement parts available.

But I know it's not really the same thing. My dejection is because how that is yet another nudge about how we live in a world of inequity, recognizing how huge this is, and coming to terms that it's not something I can ever begin to fix by myself. 

And then on my way home I came to this crossroads (It reads: ML King Jr. Blvd and Malcolm X St). That made me smile so big because sometimes I talk myself through social situations by asking myself if I want to do it "like Martin or like Malcolm?"

Dr. King's uncle was a local Lansing pastor and Minister Malcolm, of course, grew up in Lansing. A gray-ish day and an unexceptional photograph, but a good reminder of a moment that lifted me up.

start over

Borrowing this picture from TJA who used it as a reminder that we can all start over. 

Things can change...

I know I can grow.

how do you know

how do you know

the sudden bunny in the trees
a streak of white tail a trail

ringing in the heart 

how do you know

the storm hovering overhead

brooding here, eager to grab

cobwebs and hope

how do you know

the scream waiting in readiness 

to jump out of the darkness

that is my throat 

I don't know 

I wait to reckon with these knots 

with silent prayers to calm

the angry seas inside 

Pic: Nu and At taking off for a walk-and-talk post dinner. Things did not go as I'd hoped. 

time begins to hurt when

the leaf's green and the river's green 

hesitate on unripeness 

but I am sun-warmed and life-bound 

and have to try it

for you are taller than I can remember

stronger than you know

yet here I am trying to keep the monster

hidden... and quiet

O hush little baby, let's flee this moment 

in its blossoming bruises

for my mind is still trapped underwater

and cannot anchor it 

 Pic: Red Cedar, earlier this week. (I needed a reminder of calm after some particularly horrible hours this morning. I'm thankful for Big A being there and community help.)

five Friday yays

Got a shoutout from the wonderful Melissa at Stirrup Queens... that always makes my week!

Finished up work for the week--even got in a couple of things ahead of deadline (to make up for the things past due). 

Nu and I got home around the same time. We're watching Riverdale together per Nu's request. It's so over the top, we keep laughing--so I guess that's the good part. 

A quick dinner prep and then off to the train station. Nu DJ-ed through the train delay and then finally we got Big A home. We'll have him for about 36 hours.

Pic: Big A and Huck who are bestest pals reunited. 

exhale

The moon was still up in the sky when Scout, Huck, and I took Nu to the school bus before I went to work and back in the sky when I got home. Three classes, three meetings, and all of them very necessary. It helped that Big A helped in the morning before he left to take the ferry back to WI and At came over in the afternoon to hang out with Nu (and took Nu to some labor meetings 💗) while I was at work. 

I brought back some Angel Tears and Devil Tears from Pizza 1 One for the kids. A long time ago, L asked what they were and I described them; she then summarized that it sounded like they had taken the one healthy thing about pizza (the tomato sauce) and left all the other stuff. She's right. These "tears" always get a rockstar welcome from the kids though--yesterday was no exception.

There was a comment on yesterday's post, which was very true in that there were only two people in my photo. I struggle with this a lot. When we moved to this house we were eight human and non human persons and three generations--my parents, Big A and me, and the two human and two canine kids. It does feel kind of empty with just Nu, part-time Big A, and me as the humans living in this house now. I'm trying to come to terms and make peace and all that jazz because I know that this is the way of things. But it's not easy. And I haven't been successful. (Nicole--I must really put Philpott's Bomb Shelter on my list RIGHT NOW.)

inhale

Checked and cleared off my calendar early today and then I was able to hike with Big A, give Scout and Huck a groom, and make s'mores with Baby A. 

A midweek respite seemed necessary today. Especially since I'll be on campus from 8 am to 8 pm tomorrow (and that's not counting the commute).

It's like the deep breath before a deep dive...

Pic: Pre-s'mores. The bad haircuts I gave the puppies are sadly obvious. (The vet no longer offers grooming, and I didn't want to take them to some chain place because there are so many horrible stories.)

coming in

my eyes are insistent

yearn to find amends

rivers wake unaware

these roads catch fire

for ever there is light 

I unfasten the heavy

I catch myself happy

a song between sighs

what is day, if not this

Pic: Sunrise over the Maple River. I get to work so early these days!

one more time

A long time ago, At told me he read this thing on reddit about how we sometimes don't know when it's the last time you're doing something. The example they gave was picking up your kid--there's no fancy celebration for that... one day you do and then somehow you never do it again. 

I do know that I was picking up At when he was seven (I only stopped when I got very pregnant with Nu), but I don't even remember when I stopped with Nu.   

So today, I decided that I wanted to pick up my kids one more time. They were game: 

overheard, over here

today I bring nothing but words

they're probably in the wrong order

but let's wander in adventure soon

although I'm too obstinate for miracles

as we walk together, try not to notice 

I brought my books though they fall apart 

if you believe in madness and darkness

be ready to see the stars twinkling through

up next

fog like whiteness giving over to nothing
only scarves and neckties are flowering

I play a matchbox and then a jukebox

sitting here quietly with my knife

I cut a path of spirals through smiles

of my own motherhood brimming

only to hide under frosty glares

as though the sky is burning 

isn't it strange how we define words

with more words and... gesturing

how even the ruins of a day

can be filled with people

____________________

Note: KB talked to KO and I got a long, kind, and helpful walk-and-talk about options (with KO). Cannot describe how it feels to be understood and validated.

promise

from under the belly of the bridge

I arrive like wonder 

like a wound

flickering like prayer or heartbeat 

remembered, returned,

and restitute

surely, it must be true that others

too, climbed language like

a promised land