Roo and his bitc…uh…girls.
I was in my bedroom when I heard a hullabaloo outside my window. I opened my curtain and saw my entire flock of chickens huddled under the low branches of a tree. At first glance, I thought one of them was standing outside of the group, but upon closer inspection, I saw it was a hawk. It was almost as if he was sizing up which hen he’d like to have for lunch.
Okay, I’ll admit it. I don’t have it all together. You know those times I posted a picture with pride, or said we’re doing just fine, or made it look easy to parent a kid with a disability? That might have been a straight up lie, or it might have been me just trying to convince myself that I was qualified to do this job, or maybe we were finally having a good day.
But you see, the world is set up in such a way that people with disabilities, specifically my kid, are handed the short end of the stick day after day – and that’s if anyone bothers to hand them a stick at all. I have to watch her get looked over again and again: in jobs, by the waitress at the restaurant, in love.
I couldn’t look at her face
One more day.
Her cry was weak
My milk no longer strong enough
For a toddler
But I had no choice
No options
No food.
My legs were shaking, and my breath was coming in gasps. This horse felt like a lit fuse underneath me; so much energy that it fairly vibrated out of his muscles and skin and made mine respond in the same way. He is big and fit and powerful, and I often feel slightly out of control when I am on him. This day, even more so. I fought to stay calm, to trust my training.
Oh, Crossfit. I stare at my jump rope for a minute before the workout starts, hoping I will have some sort of epiphany. I mean, after 6 years, one deserves an epiphany, doesn’t one? Double unders – getting the rope under my feet twice for each time I jump – have been my nemesis since the beginning. There have been some ugly moments that include crying, throwing the jump rope across the gym, and threatening to choke my coach with it. On the (questionable) recommendation of a friend, I even slept with it under my pillow for a while and spoke sweetly to it. If you ask me to do single unders, I can do them till the cows come home. Doubles? Not so much.
No one ever wrote your name in the stars.
*
Never sat under the night sky
And pointed up, saying,
See how it makes an A, and an N?
You belong to the universe.
You’re made of stardust, child.
*
No one laid under a tree
In the shade on a sunny day
And pointed up, saying,
See how the world spins?
How all of nature is swirling with joy
Over who you will be?
You belong to Mother Nature.
You’re made of the earth, child.
*
No one wrapped you up
When you were angry or sad or scared
And pointed to your heart, saying,
See how you feel?
It’s okay. I’m here.
You belong to me.
You’re made of me, child.
*
Who taught you to
Narrow your eyes
Suspicious of everything
And everyone
Who will let you down…
Because they will let you down?
*
Who has said,
You’re not stardust,
You’re just dust.
You’re not made of earth,
You’re just dirt.
You’re not made of me,
I don’t want you?
*
Give me a chance, child.
*
Let me show you
The glimmer of stardust in your eyes,
And how your horse responds
To the earth in your body,
You two made of the same clay.
*
Let me show you
That you are me,
*
And I am you,
*
And we belong to each other,
*
And that it is safe to hope.
*
“The cosmos is with us. We are made of star-stuff. We are the way for the universe to know itself.”
- Carl Sagan
I’m walking out of the gym, laughing about what my coach said about my deadlift. I step out into the sun and reach into my gym bag to pull out my phone. I flip up the screen, turn off the do not disturb button, and instantly my phone is bombarded with texts, all from my kids and my husband. The first one that comes through is:
“If I don’t make it I love you and I appreciated everything you did for me.”
It’s my high school senior. The one who just signed a commitment to UC Denver and put a deposit down on her first apartment. There’s an active shooter at her high school.
I was in yoga the other day, minding my own business as usual. I get in and out of there, not make eye contact, trying not to feel awkward whilst putting my thumbs to my third eye and saying, “Namaste.” I’m a crunchy, leftie, granola hippie, but that doesn’t mean I want to hang out with folks like me, for crying out loud. We’re weird and far too prone to violating personal space.
Granted, it’s been a stressful couple of weeks, and I already have to defend my cooking nightly to my youngest. She came wandering into the kitchen as I was scrambling to cook dinner (and oh, P.S., hold the world together).
She innocently (?) said, “Hmm. It smells like coconut?” Now, I know she hates coconut, but she didn’t know I was using coconut flour to cook her favorite meal, chicken tenders. I snapped, “Yeah? Well it is! And if you don’t like it, you don’t have to eat it!” (And by snapped, I mean yelled.)
You know what makes me anxious about my anxiety? The way it just happens to me. Like, I’m walking along in the garden of life, picking daisies and enjoying the warm sunshine on my back, when all of the sudden, I become aware of something lurking behind a bush. I catch movement out of the corner of my eye, but can never quite put my finger on it. I run through the questions in my mind: did I leave the gate open? Did I invite it in, somehow? Did I miss the warning signs that it was going to camp out in my body? Nope, nope, nope. It just happens, out of the blue, and that makes me anxious as hell. Anxious-er.
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