Memory

December 27, 2009


What will I remember of these days? These days that begin with tiny cold feet pawing me in bed, often waking up to the whole family piled in our bed, the kids talking to Evie, cajoling us to get out of bed and make them toast, etc. Will I remember my crusade to conserve maple syrup (I cringe to think of the amount of money I spend a year on pure maple syrup, whatever that means. Why can’t there be some happy medium between Aunt Jemima’s high fructose corn syrup and $20-a-quart maple syrup?)
Will I remember my striving to cheerfully keep rooms clean, keep clothes-toys-books-dust from literally burying us alive, like the terra cotta armies buried with royalty in China? I picture them sometime, frozen under layers of dust and sand. It would not take that long for us to be so buried, if we only stood still long enough. Sometimes, if I leave the house for the morning or afternoon, and return—being gone for, say, about three hours-- I think, upon returning, that we are already half there—half buried under our own debris. The funny thing is, the debris is all things we love—the kids art stuff, favorite toys they are playing with, in process of creating… it is our memory-taking gadgets, our camera and video camera—our cells, constantly being mis-placed and losing their tails, running out of batteries, wanting both to connect us to cross-coast loved ones, and to distract us from our present tasks. All these objects form the tiny particles of sand and dust that bury us, minute by minute, until at the end of the day I am digging us out, dusting the children off, bathing them…

I have digressed. The baby woke, nursed, then fell back (literally) in to a deep slumber. She is now making these little purring noises like a kitten; she is so, so sweet when she sleeps. She is getting in her second phase of baby hair, and it feels like duck down, all soft and fuzzy. She has that baby smell still, and likes to be close to you when she sleeps. With the first two, I loved them, heart-breakingly loved them, but it was so hard. I kept thinking, much of the time, about the paradox of so much love in the midst of hardship, and wondering what the parallels were to people who stay in abuse relationships. Here I was—so in love with this baby, but feeling so ill-used… both by the baby, and the situation… it sounds pathetic, but it sums up my emotional state for longer than I would like to admit. But…this baby is different. She is sweet, through and through. No ceaseless crying. She has brought so much joy to our family, and without the accompanying hardship and sorrow I felt with the first two.

Again, I digressed. The question at stake: how will I remember these days? And then…how will the kids remember them? A few things are certain, though not necessarily comforting: I will not remember everything. I will not remember the weary details, the feeling of monotony and uselessness. I will not remember the dust bunnies and dirty toilets, the uneaten food I throw out after dinner battles, and the unbelievable number of leaves that have been tracked through my hardwood floors this year. I will probably remember different things than I think. When I look back on our four years in Lynden, I most often remember the sun coming through our dining room windows, the kids making prism rainbows with the candlesticks—reading in the afternoon, while they were sleeping, with the sun and my blanket warming me, and a pot of tea and a bowl of trail mix keeping me company. Looking out at the peak of Mt Baker in the distance, and the green of our neighbor’s house and grass. Fearing that someone would knock on the door and interrupt my quiet. I will remember the kids in the backyard, the treehouse, playing on the apple tree, the kiddie pool, dahlias, garden-attempt. I will remember putting in our patio, how we lovingly tried to make that house perfect, as if we would always stay there—the wood stove (that the new owners promptly removed!) the basement remodel with expensive carpet… I could go on. We were freezing in the winter and boiling in the summer, but it was a sweet house, like first love… just suited for us. And we were ready to move on when it was time to go… for the most part.

Will I remember, from this year, my morning times with Audrey? Monday Minnow, Tuesday baking, Wed Bible Study, Thursday home school and laundry, Friday fluff and buff the house? My conflicting emotions about keeping Audrey out of preschool this year—enjoying the extra year with her, worrying that I am not doing enough to make her environment rich, etc… purchasing flashcards, etc… and not staying at it like I should. What will I think of all this in ten years—or will I?



When I go in to tuck the kids in at night, they are so angelically beautiful sleeping. They hardly look real; it is almost painful to look at them, they are so lovely… and so unlike their waking selves. Not that they aren’t beautiful awake; they are just so rarely quiet, and never have that far-away wistful look they have when sleeping. But when I close my eyes and lean in to tuck Hudson in to sleep, and put my nose to the top of his head, burying it in his hair, it is still the same as when he was a baby. I used to quiet him to sleep that way, as a fussy baby—breath on his head, slowly, willing myself to relax and pass it on to him—I read it in a baby book, and was annoyed that it sounded so easy –but over time, it worked… at least I remember it working. There’s the question of memory again.

My children are so tangible—I hold and carry and hug and move them a hundred times a day. We have more verbal and non-verbal communication in a day than I have with most other people I love in a week. With all the immediacy of our interactions it is impossible for me to imagine my life with them in a more distant role—say, as a teenager, or, an adult. What will I become in that process? Who will they become?