I took a long time to learn that joy and contentment come from details and moments. Many people say so, but learning it isn't as easy as reading or hearing it. I took even longer learning that this is not just about noticing those details and moments but also about seeking them, creating them, sewing them into life.
Almost ten days of summer have passed. I think I've used them well. Last weekend, we went to a park (one of my goals!). We brought egg salad sandwiches, dill pickle halves, and pretzels for a picnic. We kicked sharp little pine cones out of the way and spread a blanket between trees. Oliver noticed that we were doing something different. He lunged for a handful of pine needles to put in his mouth. I let him gum a pickle instead. Josh blew bubbles. Couples with strollers passed. Men played tennis behind us.
We put the stroller to the test and started on the nature trail. I expected this to be a short dirt path, but we probably walked for an hour. I used most of the muscles in my body to push the stroller on gravel, bumps, and dirt. We pushed into a moist cover of trees like a mild rain forest. Plaques identified ferns, vines, and unearthed tar kilns. Josh climbed up to peer over the charred black rims of the kilns. I was fascinated to learn that highway departments (whatever that's called) have their own archeology teams. The idea of archeology itself is fascinating, like time traveling through objects. But I like to do it through reading diaries and seeing those bits of daily life at once foreign and familiar.
Anyway, the stroller glided over smooth wood bridges. I ran a little when Oliver got restless. We passed one or two runners, a group of paired teenagers holding hands, and an adult couple leaning on the rails of a bridge. We came out of the shade to the quiet end of a long bridge, and we looked down at a red-tinted creek. The busy silence seemed to slow my heart. I smelled wet dirt and wet rocks, tranquil.
We emerged at a second playground. One of the baby swings was open, and I held Oliver in it so he could swing. His feet went crazy as if he had to tread the air to stay suspended.
We've spent some time on the balcony. Josh saw a female duck sitting at an odd angle in the rain. "Look!" he called, and we watched as, one by one, seven tiny ducklings popped out from under their mother's wings.
"This is a good place," I've said.
I finished reading
Little Lord Fauntleroy and read
A Wrinkle in Time to the boys. I've finished my fun Francophile book,
Bonjour, Happiness, and read Katie Ward's
Girl Reading (the last chapter, particularly, will drip and swirl through my mind). Josh has read
Signing Their Lives Away, a book about the men who signed the declaration, and poetry books by e. e. cummings and Joseph Bathanti.
I've worked at the library, spending two hours planning and building course work on a desktop, breaking to wander the stacks for a minute, and then sitting in the teen section to grade for two more hours. Walking home takes a few minutes. One day, Josh picked up Panera and was returning home just as I was. He called out to me, "Hey, girl, I've got Panera and a baby. Want a ride?"
Josh has made pasta salad with mozzerella and sliced cucumber. I've eaten lemon pepper rotisserie chicken with brown rice and green beans or Triscuits and string cheese, chicken and broccoli with crab rangoons from the cheap Chinese restaurant in the shopping center past the library. Last night, I worked late on the science fiction course proposal, and Josh brought me a bowl with orange slices, walnuts, and semisweet chocolate chips. When I was dizzy earlier in the evening, he lit a woodsy candle and played soft music.
I accidentally opened a birthday present when it came in the mail. I felt guilty, but Josh just said I could have it early. So yesterday, we watched
Love Never Dies on DVD. It isn't
Phantom, of course, but I love the sets and costumes and hints of rock opera. I liked being able to see the sheen on indigo gloves, the swirled embroidery on a black coat, the swing of long earrings, the ink splatters on a sheet of music, the microphones buried in hairlines. Josh, always watching for an opportunity to make a sassy comment, said, "Remember when I arrived suddenly, and you were shocked like Christine?" He paused. "No. You were like the phantom." That echoed a thought I've had for a while: I have been drawn to the idea of Erik since I was eight years old, and I assumed I must be like Christine. But really, I'm more like Erik. Still, I fully expect that when Oliver is older, he and Josh will sing "The Beauty Underneath" for me.
These connections to my old and deep loves build and repair. Musical theater was like protein to me, and it still is when I pause for it. One of my dear childhood memories is of my mother reading
A Wrinkle in Time to me even though I was old enough to read it myself. Though that was probably sixteen or seventeen years ago, Charles Wallace, the milk for cocoa on the stove, Mrs. Whatsit with her scarves, and the man with the red eyes were still like photo albums I made at ten or eleven and reopened when I read at twenty-six. I smiled at the thought that I've now read the book to my own child, and I've shared it with my companion.
Aunt Beast, with her singing, washing, feeding, and soothing a fearful and angry Meg, made me relax. I would feel silly telling Josh that he is my Aunt Beast, but he is. He calms my fevers of anxiety, grief, and sullenness. But he also waits and lets me fuss while I come around to what I know I need to do.
I've made some progress in my current journal, one from the Christmas stocking my mother gave me. It's purple, green, blue, and gold with peacocks. Every page is full color and has tiny lines. I have sticky notes with my summer to do list on the feathered end pages. I have a letter in a purple envelope to mail today. It has a red stamp with
Love in white twisted ribbon script.
The pools have been closed, but we've walked. We've lingered by the pond, and we're scratching our bug bites now. We've gone to Ulta, and I've come out with only colors in my head and shimmered smudges on my fingertips. We've been to Cold Stone Creamery, where Josh ate vanilla ice cream with strawberry syrup and funnel cake pieces, and I ate vanilla with chocolate chips and walnuts and pondered the ice cream cupcakes.
Josh rearranged our bedroom last night, moving the bed under the window, moving our wedding cake dresser and my fragile black desk to the open wall where we can actually use them easily. I think we will be able to bring in one or two new bookcases. I'll let my journals out of their crammed, horizontal double stacks.
I feel myself unfurling.
Image:
http://www.tumblr.com/blog/jenndalynphoto
