11 O'Clock Thoughts

Maybe I have nothing better to do.

Maybe it's the cold, trapping me indoors and trapping my thoughts, too.

Maybe I'm tired of listening to myself talk.

Maybe it's my age.

Maybe I'm hibernating.

Maybe I'm sad about things, happy about others, and neither of the two feels worthy of writing.

But I've been introspective lately.

I want to minimize my life: the material things, the distractions, the need to keep up. I want to stop reading 500 blog posts from strangers, and instead read 10 from good friends.  I want to be in the here and now of whatever my life consists of; and right now, it consists of mothering, and making macaroni and cheese, and running my hands over a beautiful mug at Target, and taking five minutes to write in this space when the streetlamps blink on and the house is silent.

I want to write the way Carl Sandburg wrote about the city up the road; I want to know something that deeply and love it that poetically. I want to feel something good that much. I want to connect to something like that. I want to be passionate in a way that bubbles up when someone presses me, instead of shouting what I love and what I hate to whoever will listen. I want to rid my sight of shallow things. I want to be focused. I want to hold on to some mystery.

I want to quit being angry. I want to break the anger and mistrust that the past four years has woven through me. I want to be at peace- with myself, with others, and with what the world hands me. I want to stop being jealous of people who are happy. I want to be happy for them. I want to love them how I would want to be loved. I want to be the kind of mother that these two can remember as joyful. I want to exhale more. I want to give myself room for quiet, and learn how to appreciate the chaos and noise in our home.

I want to stop settling for things I like, and go after what I love. I want to eat something with more calories if it tastes better. I want to buy the nicer pair of shoes. I want to hold on to old things that are better than new ones. I want to stop looking at people with beautiful lives and make my own life beautiful. I want to ignore what's in style. I want to stop imitating. I want to cultivate my own good taste and make my own way.

I want to learn something. I want to make a paper crane from the origami book I bought ten years ago and never took down from the bookshelf. I want to do something with my hands, something that I can show Walter and Millie someday, something that is useful and makes our house more beautiful or blesses someone else or tastes better or keeps some lost art from being completely lost altogether. I want to take pleasure in something small. I want to remember what my handwriting looks like. I want to use more stamps and envelopes.

I want to remember my roots. That my father was a fireman and my mother was a nurse. That I was named for my mother's twin brother. That I grew up between these squares of soybeans and corn, and that they look like a patchwork quilt from an airplane window. That I'm a nearly thirty year old woman without a degree in a town full of perpetual caps and gowns, and that it's okay. That I'm not like everyone else just because I like Starbucks and scarves and drinks in Mason jars. That I have a good heart, and need to demonstrate it more often. That I love how I feel when I write, even if it's not published in a small newspaper or glossy magazine. That I had 25 years of hopes and mistakes and fears and loves before Amelia and Walter.

I don't really know what I want.

But I think it's something like this.

We're Here

"The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer."

― Pablo Neruda

Today, Sky and I have been married for four years. Four years from that snowy, January day when we made so many promises, and went out for Italian food that night to celebrate. Four years of everyday. Four years of striving. Four years of memories, both beautiful and broken.

I am the kind of girl who craves fanfare on milestone days. Whether it's a holiday, birthday, or anniversary, I want the decorations or the food or whatever it is that comes along with the celebration. But Sky is working a lot of overtime this week and next; I mentioned that his civilian job was basically that of a drill sergeant, and the new recruits just started, so he's only been home to sleep a few hours before he goes back for another long day.

And then, of course, there is where we've been lately. A lonely, confused place. I asked him a few nights ago if we'd ever had a happy anniversary. "No," he said quietly.

A dear friend is going through marriage problems. And she talked about celebrating her anniversary in a quiet way. A way that hopes more than expects. A way that doesn't make unnecessary demands on the day, but simply says, "We've arrived at this day. We're here." In some way, maybe that's more meaningful than celebrating four years of easy happiness. It took so much of my heart- no, all of it- to make it this far. It took all my strength to be here.

Today, Sky and I will be apart. There won't be a romantic candlelit dinner, bouquet of roses, or a sentimental Hallmark card. But there will be the beginning of another year of marriage. Another year of being a family. That's still significant.

I hope our life together gets sweeter. I hope our days get happier. I hope we remember how our hands fit together again, and how it felt on that first day of promises.

For now, we're here. And for today, that's enough.

Swear You Won't Forget

"We were new then, our lives stretched out before us. 

For this very short time, it would be just the two of us  [...]" 

— Bridget Asher

Hey you.

Goodness. It hasn't been quiet around here lately. It seems like every day is filled to overflowing with to do lists and little ones who need us. Sometimes, I almost forget how we began.

But do you remember the times before? You were there in the desert, learning to sleep to the sound of explosions outside. I was here in Chambana, sitting behind a desk in a doctor's office. And we wrote. And we missed. And no one we knew understood how it was possible to fall in love that quickly. And we hoped with the greatest of hopes.

Back before there was spit up on my shoulder, or a little girl pulling your hand to lead you somewhere important, there was us. And we flirted, did wild things, and made big plans. We drove fast on gravel roads in the country, the tires kicking up a long trail of white dust behind us. We walked down city sidewalks in fancy clothes underneath glittering stars. We got married without even having enough money to spend the night in a hotel in town, so I sprinkled rose petals around our apartment. We always bumped into each other in that tiny galley kitchen with pots hanging on the walls, pretending we both knew how to cook. We climbed the thousand, steep steps to our apartment late at night, and sometimes after a few drinks that made us a little wobbly. You made me laugh and worry and cry and beam, and gave me butterflies during every minute of it.

Please don't forget me then. Don't forget how blonde my hair was, or the heels I wore but could never look confident in when I walked. Don't forget the times we stayed up talking until 2am, then stopped to dish out bowls of ice cream before talking even more. Don't forget the way we always held hands, always touched, never wanting to be apart for a minute. And if I really did make you nervous like you said I did, don't forget that either.

Because I won't forget the you from those days. I'll always remember the boy who slipped the silver ring off my finger and wore it all the way back to Afghanistan. The boy who swore he'd never marry but told his mom he'd be marrying me after the first time we met. The boy who I loved more than anyone I'd loved before.

Deep down, I'm still her. You're still him. We still have that love in our hands. It's the kind of love that only comes once in a lifetime for most people, but a lifetime is how long it'll last if we let it.

The Best Part

There are secrets- small ones- that I've kept from a couple people, but tonight feels like a good night to let them go.

The picture above is one I've had for a year or two. It was something my mom and I found during one of my visits to Oregon. It was such a sweet, little saying, and we both sighed over it. I think she ending up sneaking to the cash register with it and giving it to me later that day.

But what Sky didn't know is that my mom waited to send me the sign until things were good again. When she got that sign, my marriage was upside down and inside out. It felt beyond repair and beyond recognition. There were few shreds left. When things settled and she did send it to me, it all took another turn not much longer after that. I wrapped up the frame, put it in a box, and shut the closet door...until we moved, that is.

I rediscovered it among all the bubblewrap, and decided it needed a place here.

And what my mom didn't know is what Sky said to me that night, as we were putting up a stack of photos along a bookshelf. As he arranged a photo of us dressed up for the ball, a folded flag from his service in Afghanistan, and that little frame, he commented on how they fit so well together. I blinked and looked at the three, searching for something they had in common, and finally assuming he meant the stars in them all. He shook his head. He reminded me of the way we met- how he was my brother's roommate during that deployment, and had it not been for that deployment, we'd likely have never known each other.

"No," he corrected me, adjusting the frame a little. "When they ask me about the best part of the military, I can say it was you."

Sometimes, things are worth the wait.

Remembering

{Sky in an old, abandoned church we found.}

“Sometimes I need
only to stand
wherever I am 
to be blessed.” 
― Mary Oliver

While he was away, I began, slowly, to remember. Piece by shining, fragile piece, our marriage came back to me.

As much as people talk of their heart remembering, there is just as much that the heart can forget, or can lose like a wedding band on a sandy beach, never to be seen again. And I had forgotten. The way I loved when he was near, the feel of his hand grasping mine, the pride of telling the world, "I'm his." Everything was lost, and cold, and everything hurt.

The only way I've seen trust come back is through time. But I knew that those four months apart could easily be our final unraveling, because the threads were already so loose. That first night he was gone, I had so many different emotions, I could only look up at the ceiling and wonder what life would be like when he got home. Hope was thin, and faith, thinner.

Time passed, and I felt myself missing him more and more. And when he walked through the door late that night and held me against his rough uniform, everything felt different. More importantly, nearly a month later, it is still different. He has become the one I thought I was marrying, the one I couldn't wait to say vows to and be swept up in forever.

They say happiness shouldn't be placed in people, because they inevitably will let you down. I can't help but get much of my happiness from lots of people, though; my daughter, this baby, my parents, and my friends are what make this life sweet. And him. Finally, beautifully, him.

Marriage is supposed to be a journey that will take years and years of my life, and we're only three and half years down the path. Yet it has brought me to my knees many times, leaving them bloodied and bruised. How bewilderingly unexpected that it is coming back to the beginning of newlywed amazement and happiness.

This place feels so much like home now. He feels so much like home now.

The Cafe

"The story you finished was perhaps never the one you began." 

— Salman Rushdie

I've been thinking a lot lately about the girls I could have been. There have been so many.

There could have been the single girl working at a vet's office, coming home to her dogs every night. Days spent with sweet friends, but depression and confusion when all alone.

The fiance of a young redneck with an old, creaky pickup truck, who had just bought his first old, creaky house in a old, creaky small town. He picked out paint colors for the walls in shades I've only seen inside Play-Dough cans.

The girlfriend of the former Marine who had a poster of the atomic bomb above his bed and couldn't sleep though his PTSD despite the Ambien and alcohol. We felt destructive and self-loathing together, but I often wondered if he ever hoped to achieve more.

The girl who decided, at 25 years old, children and marriage were never to be. She dreamed of a series of long term boyfriends, travel, and no real commitments to anything.

But mostly, I think about the girl in the cafe. I've always thought about her the most.

I would be sitting in local cafes every day, slowly reading the paper, lazily typing at the keys on my computer. My glasses would be slightly askew, my hair up in a bun with a pencil stuck through it. And when a brilliant idea flashed through my writer's mind, I'd pull the pencil out and feel my hair spill onto my shoulders as I scribbled.

A freelancer who makes just enough to afford the daily coffee habit and a cheap apartment in a neighborhood with brick streets. A girl who may have a boyfriend, or may not. A girl who spends more time at this little coffee shop than she does in her own bed, nodding to the waitress when she walks in, automatically getting her half-caf mocha and cinnamon bagel without needing to order. A beautifully scripted, but somewhat solitary life full of a few of my deepest passions, lived out in the small space filled with the smell of the coffee beans, clinking of china, and the chatter of strangers, not friends.

I probably wouldn't even know. But maybe one day, when a pregnant mother opened the door, clutching the hand of her little 2 year old daughter, I would. "Millie," I'd hear her whisper, "Let's sit here and I'll get you a glass of milk."

And maybe a few tears would fall as I would write about how I could have been that girl, too.

No Such Person at This Address

"Strap a piece of toast -buttered side up- to the back of a cat. Throw the cat out of the window. 

Will the cat land on its feet or will Murphy's law apply?" 

— Alan Fletcher

In those last few days before Sky was shipping out to school, I made a huge to do list of all I would work on while he was away. I would look at it now, but it got lost about 3 days after he was gone. If I could look at it, though, I would just laugh. I do remember enough of it to know I haven't done a single thing on it. Oh, Erika. How cute to think you would accomplish things. But it turns out that it's just as well I didn't clean organize every closet like I planned.

Everyone warned me about Murphy's Law, and how Murphy would inevitably strike the second Sky's plane lifted up the landing gear. It's the worst-kept military spouse secret. What they didn't tell me is that Murphy can come in the form of something wonderful...and still be annoying.

I was taking out the trash yesterday morning when I happened to look down the street and see a sign, and it looked familiar to me. Squinting through my dirty glasses, I realized I had seen it once before, when we first moved to this street. It was in front of another building my landlords own, and it was advertising a 3 bedroom for rent.

Here is the back story: when Sky and I were first married, we rented the upstairs of an old house near campustown. It had five million steep, narrow stairs to reach it, was either blisteringly hot or sub-zero cold, and had a galley kitchen smaller than a Mini-Cooper. I loved that place; it had lots of charm and character, and it was only a couple blocks away from an amazing farmer's market, a quaint downtown, and a lovely restaurant in an old newspaper building. Completely smitten. We even got married in it.

But those 5 million stairs and temperature extremes weren't quite so tolerable with a baby on the way. A few months before Millie was born, we decided to look for a new place. We found one a quarter mile from my dad (and where I grew up), and could barely keep calm as the landlady showed us around. It was perfect, it was inexpensive compared to most places in town, and it was a very quiet, very safe neighborhood. Sky and I spent that first night on the floor even though I was pregnant- we were so excited to feel like we had a real home.

After Millie was born, I stopped working, and life settled down a bit, we realized having a three bedroom place for us was more than what we needed, and more than what we could pay. We decided to move four doors down to another building our landlords owned, this one a two bedroom and less expensive. We've been here a little over two years, and I don't regret it; we've saved a lot of money and stretched through those thinner income months.

When Sky left, he thought we should let the landlords know we were interested in a three bedroom place again. I never made the phone call, because I knew how unlikely it would be that one would open up, and I worried about affording it anyway. We could make do in this place for a few more years, I thought. When I saw that sign yesterday, though, I texted him immediately and called both my parents for advice. Going back to that place would mean the babies would have their own rooms- and while I don't care much about that, especially when they're little, I do relish the thought of not waking Millie with every 2am feeding and diaper change. I think about all the baby gear that spreads itself out into every nook and cranny, and know we'd have room to breathe in the new place. And I think about how I could cook in the kitchen and still see them in the living room with the open floor plan, instead of the way it's hidden now. We only left that place because this one was cheaper, but being a soon-to-be family of four, it makes a lot more sense to be back there now.

After talking it over with Sky (the conversation mostly consisting of: Erika- "Hey, there's a 3 bedroom open now." Sky- "GET IT.") and my parents, I called our sweet landlady and told her we wanted to do it. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where Murphy comes in. It turns out, I've somehow managed to have to PCS alone even without having orders to do so. It may be down the street, but it still requires packing this house into boxes to load on a truck, unpacking them all over again, switching everything over to the new address, etc. The move in date is before Sky gets home. And if I hate moving under any circumstances, I really hate moving without him, while pregnant, and in school. Not my cup of tea.

Before I sound like one of those annoying people complaining about good things, I want to say that it's a huge blessing, and I'm very excited to know that we won't be climbing all over each other with a new baby in the house. It's great timing, minus Sky being gone. We get to move to a bigger place without putting in a new deposit, and my dad can find us a huge moving truck for free. It can't get much better than that. I'm happy for what it means for us, and I'll be very happy to have Sky help me unpack it all after he gets home.

In the meantime, I will be up to my neck in cardboard boxes, thanking God and cursing Murphy all at the same time.

Traces

"How quick and rushing life can sometimes seem, 

when at the same time it's so slow and sweet and everlasting." 
— Graham Swift

The peach fuzz hair. The baby coos and gurgles. Those first hopeful, wobbly steps towards me. I know they all were there. They happened. But I couldn't remember.

I spent the evening watching videos of all these things, looking at a little girl I barely recognized. She's changed so much since the days of enormously puffed, rosy cheeks and silly, one tooth smiles.

It made me a little sad, thinking about all that had happened since that first day together. I wondered if I would have such a poor memory when it comes to this little one. I am already certain I will. I didn't know then that it would be like the flash of a camera, gone before I knew it and stinging my eyes from the brief burst of light. So instantaneous and bittersweet.

And yet, that's the beauty of it. That it only comes once. And it goes so quickly. And that I was privileged enough to be there in those moments, holding the baby who has become a thousand different people since that July day.

Those smallest of days are forever out of reach but always in sight. Even though they are gone, their traces are enough.

This Time

"Time is the longest distance between two places." 

— Tennessee Williams

We walked from the small wooden porch to the damp and silent street, flooded with yellow lamplight. It was 4am. He handed me the blue t-shirt he had worn a couple days earlier, crumpled and smelling of his cologne. The two of us stood next to my car, feeling as if we were the only ones on earth awake. Over and over in my head, I told myself not to cry, but tears were spilling down without any effort or notice. He tried wiping them away as more filled my eyes, and we just looked at each other for a moment before I buried my head in his chest. I couldn't help but picture the button down he wore fading into a dusty uniform.

He told me that he would be okay, and that he would take care of my brother, too. He promised me he would come home safely. I wanted to stare at his face to remember everything, inhale the scent from his hair so I wouldn't forget it. I kept thinking about his boots that would be in sandy Afghanistan instead of in this muddy Illinois small town. And I didn't really understand how it was possible to be filled to overflowing with wild hope, fiery love, intense fear, and pure dread all at the same time. When we finally let go, I drove away trying to get enough air to inhale. I made a a few blocks before the roads became blurry the rest of the way back to Champaign. I prayed a lot during that dark drive home.

But this time, there is no deployment. The only physical danger would come from a training accident, not from a war filled with an enemy's bullets or roadside bombs. This time, the months of separation are only because of a school on a post states away. There won't be the extreme heat and cold from weather in the Middle East- just the easy temperatures in a southern state. There will be phone calls and Skype chats, the kind of contact that can be hard to come by during some deployments.

This time, though, he and I are changed. I'm not sure we are that boy and girl who didn't know how to say goodbye. Instead, we're a pair with a little girl who needs her favorite blanket and monkey to sleep, and a baby still forming, six months from its first cry. We are two people with a history. We've been up and down so many times, I've lost count long ago. And though this time won't be the length of a typical Army deployment, it will still be the longest we've been apart since that first goodbye.

It should be easy in comparison. But I find myself awake at night, wondering what it will mean for us. While Sky can take every moment as it comes, I want to plan everything out in my life, down to every last detail. Life doesn't usually allow for that, however. There is no planning to this, even with the weeks of notice we've had. I don't know what to plan for anymore.

Someone mentioned it didn't seem like I will miss him much when he leaves. I will miss him. Of course I will. It is a strange and uncomfortable way to miss someone, though, when so much feels unsettled. What has happened between us isn't something that gets resolved immediately and disappears. It's something that takes so much time, so much rebuilding of trust, so much effort. It's not something done well over long distance. My worry this time doesn't spring from attacks in a dessert. It comes from what's already happened here in Chambana. This isn't the blog post that is supposed to be written before a farewell, and I know that. This is just real life. I want to miss him in that bittersweet, wistful way. I guess I'll only know once it happens.

He will be gone soon. The suitcases and green duffel are sitting in a lonely corner as a reminder. This time, we are both fighting for something. Guns and tanks are easy ways to battle, but preserving a marriage takes everything the two of us have. It's the most important war we can wage. I'm trying to borrow just a little of that wild hope from last time, needing it to see us through. I'm even praying to feel a bit of that passion and sorrow when we wave goodbye this time.

Honestly

In the interest of being open and honest, I need to share this.

This week has been really rough for our family. Two years ago, Sky and I went through something in our marriage, and I honestly didn't know how (or if) we'd make it through. This week, I found out we're going through them again now. And truthfully, I don't know how we'll do it all over.

Between all the rest of life right now- the news of a new baby and the struggling with all those first trimester symptoms, full time school, watching Millie, working, and caring for my home, I feel overwhelmed. I don't have the energy to handle this, physically or emotionally. I was just treading water with it all before- and this storm blew in out of nowhere. It feels about as good as a punch to the gut.

It's strange- I have a post saved in drafts, all about marriage. I was going to tell you how I have gotten dozens of emails behind the scenes of this blog. So many people are going through rough times in their relationships, and they've confided in me about it. It's very humbling, and it reminds me that no marriage will ever be perfect. Some of those marriages have lasted. Others have faded.

I just didn't think I'd be needing advice like them so soon. I thought we were strong again. And we aren't.

If you pray, I would appreciate your prayers. Thank you.

Dear Alice

My Grandmother Alice, right, and her sister, Caroline

Dear Alice,

You were the sweetest grandmother. Although I only had the chance to spend the first few years of my life knowing you, I still have a few memories that are golden- things like you playing with wooden puzzles with me on your living room floor, or coloring with me at your kitchen table while the adults talked away. I've never heard anyone say a bad thing about you, but had lots of cute stories, like Dad telling me you would always ask him if he wanted a slice of pie, cutting him a whole fourth of it. After your stroke, we would come and visit you often, and though you couldn't speak then, I still knew we were both glad to see each other. I remember when you passed away that April day. It was the first time anyone close to me had died. Even then, I wished we had more time. I was glad I was the oldest in our family, and could remember things my brothers would never know.

You were the first grandparent to leave this earth, and the rest have followed you since then. Sometimes I think about all of them, but you most of all. You didn't get to see me grow very tall, or even have the chance to play with my brothers the way you did with me. I wonder if you can see us down here, or if you're happily obvious to earthly things now. But mostly, I wonder what you'd think if you did.

I wish I could introduce you to Millie. You'd make such a lovely great-grandmother to her. I'm sure, if you were here today and 90 years old, you'd still try those same puzzles with her. I wonder if you'd be sad that Dad and Mom didn't stay together. I wonder if you'd still live in the next town over, in the brick house you raised Dad in, with the flowers bordering the driveway I rode my tricycle around on. I wonder if you'd still be friends with your next door neighbor, who still sends me Christmas cards to this day.

Maybe you can take a peak at us every now and then, and already know all these things. But if not, I can't wait to sit at the kitchen table with you again, doodling and catching up with life since you left.

The Water

(This was originally written for Erinn at It's the Journey.
She asked for a post on what inspired me, and this is what came to mind at that moment.
I've decided to share it here today.)

  

When I think about what inspires me, it only takes me a minute to go back to that place- Seattle, but more specifically, the water.

There was something so magical on the shoreline. Maybe it’s because we don’t have the same kind of vast expanse of rippling waves in the Midwest. Maybe it’s just because so many others seem to feel the same way. I think Pablo Neruda loved the sea more than any woman he sighed over, because he once wrote of it, “Here I came to the very edge where nothing at all needs saying… [and] everything is blue again like morning.” That’s just how I feel, too.

Nothing at all needs saying. Somehow, all my thoughts seem to wash away with the tide, and I find myself weightless without them. There are very few places on this enormous earth that can make me feel so beautifully alone and so perfectly content.

So some nights now, when everyone else is sleeping, my heart drifts back there. I close my eyes, and just wish for the waves to drown out all other noises and sweep through my soul.

Today

source

Remembering, 

each and every year.

The Good Times

 'Things change, but the carousel is always here. It reminds people of the good times." 

— Glenda Millard 

I've had a sidekick for just over two years now. I think the feeling of wonder, of didn't the nurse just hand to me for the first time? will never really fade- and I hope it doesn't. And when she woke up as a two year old last week, I asked her what we should do on her birthday. "Carousel?" I offered. "Carrysel!" she chirped. So we went, and rode once for free after the older woman at the gate said a birthday ride is a free one, and once more in honor of being two. Sometimes once just isn't enough.

After that, we stopped in at the bookstore to turn in a coupon for a free birthday cookie. If you want to see pure joy beam from a child, just hand them a bakery item made of pure sugar.

And finally, we headed to a place that soothes and delights us- the tiny library in the next little town over. After all, Elmo is there, just waiting to pop out from behind a curtain and say "Hi, Mama! Hi, Daddy!" in a very Millie-sounding voice.

We finally headed home, tired and content. Though I'll strive to be parent above all else until she's much older, it's such an beautiful feeling to know that one of my best friends is this baby, this tiny sprout who will grow into someone amazing. 

And even when she's had many more birthdays and a whole circle of friends around her, I'll still remember our carousel days, and how we spun around and around but time stood sweetly still.

P.S. My sweet blog friend, Jamie, is having a big giveaway in honor of her birthday today (happy birthday, Jamie!), and I get to be a part of it! So if you'd like a second chance at winning some fold over elastic hair ties from me, plus lots of other goodies, head over to her blog today and enter!

P.P.S. Thank you for the comments and emails after my last post. Someone even said I was brave for my honesty, but the truth is that I needed to say it because there are some bits of this "real life" world that cut too deep to brush aside- it definitely wasn't bravery. I did, however, worry about the reaction I would get- not even the disagreements, but the same pain that I felt earlier that day. Instead, I felt nothing but acceptance and kindness, and I thank all of you for that. It's a beautiful and humbling thing to know I can go to my blog as a safe haven, to tell you my heart, and know it's okay to do so. I appreciate it so very much.

Two Years in a Flash

"All children, except one, grow up." 

— J.M. Barrie

Oh Millie.

You were just one yesterday, and I couldn't believe it then. You were just born the day before that. At least, that's how my heart sees it.

And now, you're two. Two years of life, gone by in a flash.

Those two years have been filled with memories; they are treasured moments I will never forget. But what I remember most about the last two years was your first day- the first time we met. Seeing you there in my arms, with your tiny fingers and rose red lips, I felt as if I were the one who had just been born. I've never felt more alive in all my years, before or since that day, than I did at that very moment. You breathed something into me that so beautiful, so God-given, so magical that all I could do when the doctor held you up was cry at how perfect it was. How perfect you are.

And my, this year. While your first year was full of change from newborn to baby, this year has changed you from baby to little girl. There are still tiny rolls of baby fat that I love to feel in your hugs, and there are countless moments of new discoveries, but it was a different kind of year. You learned to walk, to say your first word and then your first 500 words, to put together sentences, ask for what you want, and tell me when you have a boo-boo. Walking turned to running, you outgrew more clothes and shoes, and you learned how to sing songs. Even when you request "Wheels on the Bus" 10 times over on the way home, it's worth it to hear your small voice chiming in from the back seat.

You win everyone over with your smile, shining eyes, and sweet greetings. As you grow, it will be easy to dismiss me when I tell you how beautiful and smart you are, but at least believe them- the lady in the checkout line at the grocery store, the older couple on a walk, the nurse who says she won't say a baby is cute unless she means it, but that she thinks you are just gorgeous. It's true. It always will be true.

And what I've learned will always be true? That you won't really grow up. Yes, you'll grow tall, have a family, get a degree, and do big and beautiful things with your life, fooling everyone around you. But I know that your daddy and I will always remember that first day. And no matter how brilliant and bonny you become, my heart will remember the moment your fingers wrapped around one of mine.

Two or twenty two, I'll always see you in that split second of pure joy. Of new life.

Happy second birthday, Amelia Kae. I love you so.

The Carousel

"Nostalgia - it's delicate, but potent [...] in Greek, "nostalgia" literally means "the pain from an old wound." 

It's a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone.[It] isn't a spaceship, it's a time machine. 

It goes backwards, and forwards... it takes us to a place where we ache to go again. 

It's not called the wheel, it's called the carousel. It lets us travel the way a child travels - 

around and around, and back home again, to a place where we know are loved."

-Don Draper, Mad Men "The Wheel"

Millie went on her first carousel ride last week.

My dad, an avid bicyclist, happened upon a handful of tokens lying in the middle of a street in town, and scooped them into his pocket. So the other day, we made a trip to the mall.

At first, she was scared. She clung to Grandpa and wanted to keep on the stationary bench instead of the moving animals around her. But after a few turns, she began to smile.

And though she clung a little closer than usual when we took a second ride together, she lit up brighter than all the yellow bulbs we whirled by.

It's one of of motherhood's best kept secrets, I think, that we have the privilege of that nostalgia- to go back in time and remember how childhood has so many moments of pure sweetness and freedom.

We get the best part of our lives back in tiny moments holding on to tiny hands. "So weird to be back here..."

The Sweetness

It was raining today. As I drove, the rain started to lessen. When I pulled to a stop at the light, a fat little sparrow flew to the hood of the car, and sat there for a second. And it felt a little like the dove Noah sent out, coming back to tell me that everything was okay now. The whole drive there, I was looking up every chance I got to keep the tears from rolling down my cheeks and smudging my mascara. Because I felt pure relief so sweet it filled me with an pang of sadness. At last, at last, the tires underneath me sounded.

The whole story started two days before. I was sitting in church, barely listening to the announcements being played on the screen. I felt the tears then too, so powerful that I needed to do something to distract myself from opening crying in the huge room full of people. So I pulled out my planner, turned back to a blank month, and wrote out a prayer. I don't know that I've ever written one out before, but I felt so much emotion building up inside that it had to be let out somehow.

What I haven't told people- not even Sky- is what happened for me to reach this point. I know I've briefly mentioned that I started cleaning house for a lady in town- it turned out that we have mutual friends and they goes to the same church we do. One day after I had finished cleaning, a simple chat turned into a long discussion that turned into them praying for me; they told me God didn't want me to be so discouraged, that there are good things for me (and this, before I told them anything about me or my life). And then they told me to take the burden off of my shoulders about the PT test because it's not my fight. I cannot tell you how much I needed to hear that. I left their house that day feeling so lighthearted, like everything would be better.

But then, as swiftly as everything felt good, it went back to feeling bad. The last few years of my life have been the definition of when it rains, it pours. And I started thinking again about all the troubles we're facing and how there seems to be no way out. And that's the moment I pulled out that planner in church and poured everything out. I wrote vigorously, purposefully, even angrily.

I asked God-told God- that life should be better than this. That I don't want riches or power or fame, but I do want to not worry every second of every day. I want to stop the stress from permeating everything in my soul. I told him that he made so many promises to me and I wanted him to keep them. That I needed to feel him there and in control. That sometimes my 27 years have felt more like 100 and I'm tired. So tired.

The next morning, I checked on my college grant status as I've been doing every day for month. Somehow on a Sunday, it had finally posted. I was awarded the maximum amount of Pell Grant money, plus two other grants. And a few hours after rejoicing over that, an acquaintance messaged me on Facebook, asking if I'd be willing to take on housecleaning job for her, too.

So that drive today to talk to the college advisors was a drive that I didn't know if I would ever take. And there's still lots of loose ends to be tied before it's official and I'm enrolled for all my classes. But as I sat in the tiny room to take another ugly ID photo to update the old one, I couldn't help but think back to the first time I smiled in front of that blue curtain and low quality camera.

I was a few years younger. Blonder. I had just met Sky and he was far, far away. I didn't know who Millie was or that she would ever exist. I thought my life was in such perfect order. Had I stayed exactly on the path I thought I would, I would have a degree by now, and probably a raise or two at my office job. But Sky would be just a boyfriend, if anything. And I would never know my daughter, or how she'd be the most perfect girl on earth. And all the struggles that have brought me to my knees so many times wouldn't have carved out this place that I am now.

And that drive to school today wouldn't have happened. For all the fight it took, I would have missed all the sweetness.

Mama & Daddy

There's a photo on our fridge. It sounds like nothing remarkable, but it is.

Nestled among magnets for pizza places, poems I've printed out, and notes scribbled with important reminders, is our Christmas card from the past year. As many photos as I take, we have so few of our family, and even fewer printed out, so the Christmas card is kept up year round.

And every morning when Millie wakes up, and after every nap she takes, she rubs her sleepy eyes, points vaguely in the direction of the kitchen, and says it.

"Mama and Daddy?"

"Yes," I tell her every time. "That's a picture of Mama and Daddy and Millie." She remembers it's there before she is even in the room to see it. She looks at me with her eyes widening, her mouth open like she wants to say a million things at once. "Mama and Daddy," she repeats as a statement this time, not a question.

And she doesn't know. She doesn't know of the past, when it was a question and not a statement. She doesn't have any memory of those weeks and months fraught with unanswered questions and broken hopes.

Instead, she almost slurs the two words together as she says them. Mamandaddy. Together.

There are some mornings I bring her up to my chest, kiss the top of her head as I hold her to me, and whisper a thank you into the air.

Thank you that she strings along the syllables because they're able to be connected. Thank you, God, that we are one word to her.

The Scent

I have a couple bottles of perfume. They sit on my bathroom counter top within easy reach. I wore one of them nearly every day for work- a inexpensive one, but it came from England and I loved it. Another smells like roses and made me feel sophisticated and girly. They're now reserved for date nights and other special occasions. A thin layer of dust has settled over them.

Sometimes I think about Millie, and how she will remember my scent.

My mom had perfume, I'm sure, but I don't recall what kinds or the shapes of the bottles. Instead, she smelled like Oil of Olay, which she dabbed into her hands and put on religiously before her make-up. She smelled like her homemade rolls straight from the oven. She smelled like the tomatoes in her garden. She was perfumed with the life she lived, which was the life as a mother of five kids.

When I was younger, my dad always came home from work smelling like the diesel fire engines at the campus fire house. I can still walk into the station he works in now and being transported back in time, when I was wearing his old blue work tees as nightgowns that came down to my ankles. It's funny how many memories are tied up these sorts of things.

I've always wanted to find that signature scent that would be mine, one that I would wear into my eighties. But I've never found it. Even though I like those bottles on the counter, they're not me. They aren't what I want Millie or my grandchildren or great grandchildren to remember me by.

Maybe it's not for me to choose, though. Maybe, instead, it will be for Millie to tell me. And years from now, she'll sit down with me somewhere, put her head on my shoulder, and say, "Mama, I remember..." I know that whatever she remembers will be better than any pretty glass bottle I can find.

__
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The Heat, The Summer, and Him

It was as simple as listening to a song. One song, from just a few years ago, and I was transported back in time.

The bedroom of my apartment in the old house in the old neighborhood was sweltering. I sat Indian style on the bed and felt the backs of my knees getting clammy instantly. I wondered how the ancient, flowered wallpaper wasn't peeling from the walls. It was a hot, sticky summer that only seemed to cool when the world was still for a few hours. It was the only time my heart seemed to slow its beating, too.

I ran everywhere in that apartment. I took the steep stairs two and three at a time to get in the door after work. When I needed to take a shower, I dashed down the hall. And when it was time to grab something quick like a peanut butter and jelly, I impatiently squished the pieces of bread together and slid across the wooden floors back into my room where the air conditioner sputtered in vain. All this just for a boy.

Because he wasn't like the other boy I'd met a few months before- the one who I would drag myself out of a warm bed for just to sit at a diner together. We'd eat pancakes at 10 o'clock at night, talking only about his life while a late Amtrak train thundered by and drowned out my own opinions and thoughts and passions. And he wasn't like the one before that, who wanted my input on his kitchen colors- the one who seemed to picture his whole future with me but never imagined I'd have different feelings about it.

This boy was different. I would see his name pop up on my computer and feel my breath catch. And once in a while, I'd even see his face from millions of miles away. We would wave at each other and smile as if it were normal to talk to someone through static and fuzzy pictures. He would pull back the curtain and show me how my night was his day. I would pretend I didn't hear the explosions in the background. Once, we talked about the spider that stalked me in my room for nearly an hour before I had the courage to kill it. Sometimes the internet got too choppy on his end, so he would type responses and I would talk into an empty screen, still nervous.

I was consumed with his homecoming. Consumed. I daydreamed about it at my desk at work, trying to feign interest when I'd have to answer the phone . I sighed about it to an empty apartment. I worried about it with every news story, letting the tears fall more than once. And I dreamt of it often, feeling heartbroken when I awoke and realized it hadn't happened. But he did come home, safely, at the end of that summer, and so did my brother who was there with him. I thought my world was complete.

It's been just over three years that we've been together. We've been married two. I imagined we'd still be plunged into the newlywed phase at this point- that the constant hand-holding would still be constant, or that those 2 AM talks in bed over dishes of ice cream would still be happening. They aren't.

I don't know if fighting is like a Pandora's box, and once it's opened, it's there, or if the hurts created earlier ran deep enough to ingrain behaviors in us we still carry. But whichever it is, we fight- probably like everyone else. And sometimes worse than fighting, we sometimes get into a frustrated apathy. Our schedules often differ, sometimes purposefully, to the point where we often aren't waking or sleeping at the same times.

It's hard to accept that honeymoons do fade- and yet, they always do, and it's good, because real life happens after they do. Real life is what most our lives are made of, anyway- the quieter, more mundane things that glue us together much better than a honeymoon to a pretty island or a grand wedding with a thousand quests. I know we can make it to death do us part.

Yet I miss it. Even with him across the world and the sun that penetrated my bones, it was the most magical summer. I want that summer again, heat and all. And I hope that this summer is full of real life and quiet things- but that a bit of that magic seeps through the cracks.