And you’re about to watch your daughter go swirling down into the midst of all that.
She steps up to the top of the slide when her turn comes, and she turns attentively to the lifeguard, waiting for his signal, just like you’ve coached her. He nods impassively. She hesitates, just barely, just enough for you to notice, and the lifeguard says, “You can go.” And before you can blink she’s pushing herself off, and you watch from the top as your seven-year-old slides away, down and around and around. She doesn’t attempt to slow herself by bracing her legs against the side, the way she did so long ago on those slides at the playground. She’s sailing now, and at the very bottom she plugs her nose and you catch your breathe just a bit as she shoots into the pool, pushed completely under the water.
She emerges, dripping and triumphant, and swims towards the edge. And when she finally sees your smile she can’t contain her own.
When you ask her if she was a little nervous she says, “No, not at all!” and you remember the first day of first grade nearly a year ago when you asked her the same question and she gave you the very same answer.
This is your baby girl, your firstborn, your beautiful little fish.
Years ago, in college, when I traveled to Ireland, England, Wales, and France on a May Seminar, my professor talked about recording the “hard kernels of memory” from each place. Last night, I returned from a week-long trip to Minnesota with my own little family, and when I sat down to write tonight, the hard kernel of memory that came to mind was this: my little girl on that water slide. Which surprised me a bit, truth be told, because while our day at the water park was incredibly fun, I didn’t expect it to be such a moment. And yet -- and yet. The moments in which I am completely overcome by the spontaneous joy of parenting these two children of mine tend to hit me upside the head when I am least expecting it.
Of course there were other moments as well: watching the airplanes take off at sunset while we waited to board our own flight from Seattle, and hearing Isaac shriek, “Oh, look! A plane!” Tucking my children into bed with the Star Wars blankets their Grandma Cindy made for them. Running up a quiet highway in northern Minnesota one muggy morning, dense trees on either side of me. Waking at three, four, five o’clock in the morning to claw desperately at my mosquito-bitten feet. Playing board games with Matt’s cousins late into the night (or what feels like late into the night for me these days). Watching my daughter hug every single person there -- aunts and uncles and cousins -- before she would consent to going to bed. Isaac’s temper tantrum on a napless afternoon when he realized he didn’t have his Legos at the cabin and responded by throwing himself down on the grass and screaming about it. The lake, always the lake -- splashing at the water’s edge with Isaac, swimming out a little deeper with Suzannah, and the way it felt when I plunged in myself, the surface closing over my head like a cool curtain. (One evening, I went by myself shortly after a sudden rain sent us scattering inside after dinner, hurriedly gathering up the last of the plates. The clouds parted just a half hour later as the sun began to set across the water. I swam back and forth for forty-five minutes. The lake was perfectly still and reflected the orange light and pink clouds moving across the sky. I was completely alone; I could see the odd campfire through the trees on shore and heard distant bursts of laughter and conversation. Closer to me were the loons, swimming near the reeds. Their eerie cry, that sad crazy laugh, is one of my favorite things about the lakes in northern Minnesota. I swam until the sun dropped behind the trees, obscured by the last of the rain clouds, and the lake was glassy and dark.)
There were more moments back in the Twin Cities, after we packed up most of our belongings (there is always at least one forgotten t-shirt) and returned to Matt’s parents’ house -- making pizzas in the wood oven, experimenting with beets and goat cheese and trout. Walking to the local library in our swimsuits before the water park opened. My deep-in-the-gut panic when Suzannah threw up a couple of times 24 hours before we were scheduled to fly home, tapping into my deepest anxieties (flying, flying with a sick child, the fear of all of us finding ourselves similarly afflicted during the night; thankfully, she was fine the next morning, so we chalked it up to too much heat, humidity, activity, and greasy food for lunch that day). Watching my children tear around the play area at the airport and thanking God that such a thing exists, for our flight home was delayed a couple of hours. On the plus side, I had time to go have a glass of wine on my own and breathe a few quiet breaths first.
We’re home again now, settling into some kind of late-summer normal for a couple of weeks before back-to-school preparations begin in earnest. I spent most of July feeling a little desperate, which, I’ve learned, is what I do; it all moves so fast, these summer days, even when they’re filled with languid afternoons running through the sprinkler in our own backyard. But then we usually take our family vacation in early August, and by the time we return to our home in Washington, I am ready to make my peace with the end of summer.
This year, we returned from a long weekend in Glacier National Park (one of my oldest and truest friends was kind enough to get married there, my very favorite place in the world) a mere four days before our Minnesota trip. And that trip was wonderful as well, because I love weddings and because my parents were there too and because every time I visit Glacier I feel like I am visiting every self I’ve ever been, at every age. As soon as I breathe the air I start to hurt, because I know my time there has to end. I can’t explain it, really; it’s just so physical, so visceral. It is the most perfect place in the world. The shore of Lake McDonald brings me more peace than any other place I’ve ever been in my life, ever. We tried camping with the kids for the first time, and while I admit I approached this with a certain amount of anxiety, I can tell you that my hard kernel of memory for that first attempt was falling asleep in our new tent, a soft rain spattering the roof, knowing that we were all safe and warm and dry and everything important in the world was contained right there in that cozy little space. I hope I always remember how peaceful I felt in that moment.
So it was a lot of summer in that last week of July and in this first week of August, a lot of swimming in lakes, a lot of reconnecting with people from my past, a lot of deep breathing, a lot of gratitude. And that is what allows me, in some form, year after year, to settle into the golden afternoons of August. Vacations are behind us, and just enough of those lovely languid summer afternoons lie ahead. The light has already shifted. A month ago, my evening runs were hot and sunlit; tonight, the shadows stretched across the sidewalks. I’m beginning to make notes about lesson planning, the new books I’m going to teach soon. I’m filled with the earliest twinges of excitement instead of dread at the end of summer. It’s a cycle I know, and I’ve learned not to fight it. Summer is sweet because it doesn’t last forever.
No comments:
Post a Comment