An Activist In The Making?

The Writing Mamas published another blog of mine. Aubrey's recent hospital stay stretched me to think a little more politically, which shows up in "Emergency," the April 11 blog at

http://www.writingmamassalon.blogspot.com

I wrote another call to action blog for the Writing Mamas on April 4, but you'll see I was just getting warmed up at that point.

ABOUT A BIKE
(for Writing Mamas daily blog -- sorry no pix available right now)

Someone stole my boy’s bike. A new neighbor left our shared garage open and now, sadly, they’ve learned it must be kept closed.

But the bike! I bought it at a consignment shop for $20 when Dane was 2 – the future rider that he’d become, just a pedaling speck in my mind.

It turned out, too, that I’d picked a good one – and not just because it had dinosaurs on it. My husband tells me it also had solid components.

That bike inspired a 5 year-old’s rite of passage last year, and we embraced a new independence as he broke new ground – sometimes literally – without training wheels.

All summer long, we rode bikes, first in endless circles around our playground; then, to the beach in Sausalito and along the Bay Trail between Marin City and Mill Valley.

We put in about 15 miles a week on that bike –– Dane zig zagging along the Bay Trail and me easing my own bike behind him, his 4-year-old sister pedaling behind me on the trail-a-bike attached to mine.

At first, Dane’s zig zags made my hair stand on end as serious cyclists zoomed by. Eventually, though, he got the hang of using the right side of the trail, and I’d watch him more calmly from behind, his little legs spinning furiously.

Soon he was off-road on the sloping sandy edges, broken cement paths, and tall grass lining the bay. He’d stand up and test his tires in the sand, or point—first with a nod, and later, with a daring hand—to the great white heron or the snowy egret at water’s edge.

Come August, he even advanced to the hilly 5-mile perimeter of Angel Island, working in 100 degree weather with the determination of a yellow jersey rider on the Tour de France.

Now we ride to school a few times a week, and not many students do this regularly. So, when he pulls his helmet off, his hair sweaty and sticking up, his fellow kindergarteners are incredulous, “You rode again today, Dane?” And he smiles shyly with a proud sense of himself.

But riding isn’t about the attention; Dane just loves what it feels like. When his sister says, “Let’s go feel the wind on our arms,” we all know what she means.

Let’s just get out and move ourselves along. Let’s pick warm blackberries in September and brush the rain off our faces in January. Let’s gasp for air after pedaling up steep hills, or soak our socks with water while speeding through puddles. Let’s have an adventure.

And that’s what that bike represented: a little boy gaining a sense of himself and a sense of adventure, powered by his own two legs.

Fortunately, when Dane’s bike was stolen, a friend loaned us an extra one, so we’re still riding. But, right now as I think about it, that’s not the point, neither is the fact that it was stolen – that’s a separate lesson.

The point is: That bike marked the beginning of a journey. I knew the bike wouldn’t last forever, and that Dane would eventually need a bigger one, and probably want to trade in his dinosaur decals for flames, and that one day his rides wouldn’t include me – but that bike marked just the beginning, and provided the vehicle for me to witness it.

Boy, I’ll miss that bike.

Or, maybe what I really mean is: Bike, I’ll miss that boy.

Whispers
(from 11/30/06)

“Hold me?” Aubrey whispers from a pile of blankets in the middle of the hide-a-bed. She’s been out here in the living room for 24 hours now with a flu bug.

First, she’d been pale and stoic, retching so often over a 7-hour period that I quit counting after she hit the double digits.

Next, she and I spent a steel-bar-in-the-back kind of night side-by-side on the hide-a-bed while Mick and Dane slept together in the master bedroom, steering clear of our makeshift infirmary.

Today, with cheeks flushed and forehead hot, she’s laid on the hide-a-bed alternating between short naps and long stares at different objects in the room—-the Christmas tree, the guitar, the fish tank—-, scaring me with the questions she whispers: “Are the fish going to live very long? And if they die, are we just going to get new ones?”

Between cups of coffee and trips to the laundry room, I lean over her and kiss her warm cheeks.

“Hold me, momma?”

There it is again.

I sweep aside the blankets, stack some pillows behind me, and stretch my body the length of the bed.

“Come here, darlin’,” I say quietly, pulling her toward me and curling her against me. And with her head tucked under my chin, her ear to my chest, we’re back to that familiar position we established in her infancy--back to the ultimate comfort, that first whisper, the heartbeat.

Loss

I've spent the morning crying for a high school friend. She was a junior when I was a sophomore and we were in a couple clubs together. Really down-to-earth, gorgeous, sweet girl. I haven't seen her since she graduated.

Today on reunion.com I read a message she posted last May about her brother. Her brother was a year ahead of her. He was an adorable jock kind of guy and they were good friends throughout school.

Her post said that her brother had lost a 3-1/2 year battle with brain cancer. He left behind his loving wife of 14 years and their two daughters. And, I noticed in the message, as if it couldn't get any worse, one of his surviving daughters has leukemia.

I wrote my friend an email in remembrance of her brother, sending her and her family my wishes for love and healing.

She wrote back quickly to thank me, and then told me her grief was made even more unbearable this August when her 8-year-old boy drowned on vacation just 4 days after the one-year mark of her brother's death. Her email told me some days she can't even bear to breathe but she's got two other daughters to care for so she just keeps going for them. (I remember Dana saying something similar after Jesse died.) I couldn't stop sobbing.

After my first child was born, I was shocked by the fierceness of my love and my desire to protect him. One day as he slept in my arms, I found myself crying over him, begging God that my son's presence in my life would not be temporary.

Since then, my prayer has broadened to include others closest to me—my husband, my second child—but, always, my desperate plea is the same. And I know that as I sit at the computer crying for my friend, it was her plea too.

Vibrato

Aubrey has started singing with vibrato. She’s four. So, it’s not quick and snappy “Mary had a little lamb,” it’s slow and pensive: “Ma-a-ary ha-a-a-ad uh-uh-uh li-i-i-it-uh-uh-uhl la-a-a-amb”

It’s pre-schooler sings the blues.

I’m not sure where she picked this up, but I will say it seemed to start after a 2-week visit from her Grammy, who, if I may be so bold, utilizes a wee bit of the vibrato herself.

But, then again, maybe she picked it up from me. While I try to stay away from excesses of vocal warble, perhaps my voice occasionally makes those dips and dives too.

I’ll admit that sometimes in the dark when I sit on the floor of my kids’ bedroom and sing up to them in their lofts, I let my voice take off. I belt out the lyrics to their (my) favorite song, Bob Dylan’s “Tangled Up In Blue.”

In some parts, I sing fast and raspy, going somewhere edgy and rebellious. In other parts, I let my voice go slow and bluesy, somewhere unchecked and from the heart. And, so far, since they don’t ask what it means to work in a “topless bar” or why you’d light “a burner on the stove to offer me a pipe,” sometimes I let myself feel the poetry and music so deeply I could cry.

So when I hear “You are my sunshine” coming from Aubrey’s mouth like she’s channeling Ethel Merman, I admire the risks she’s taking with her sounds—and maybe even her feelings. I try to catch her eye with a nod and a smile as if to say to my girl, "That’s right--sing it, sister.”

Creature Comforts*

Dane, my five-year-old, is sitting on the couch watching Prehistoric Planet, his favorite DVD about dinosaurs. Leiopleurodon—an ancient whale-like sea creature whose jagged-tooth jaws have just been likened to a giant car-crusher—has eaten, well, a dolphin thing. (Dane, of course, could tell you its name).

Dane’s cozy under his afghan but his hands are cold. He woke up too early today so I sit out here watching the video with him. I hold a homemade hot latte in my hands. It feels so good I think Dane will like holding it too. He holds it and looks so comforted I tell him he can have a sip. He raises an eyebrow and cocks his head at me.

“Go ‘head,” I coax with a nod.

He brings the cup to his lips, tips his head back a little, drinks a sip in. He slowly brings it back down to his lap, looks over at me, and smiles the smile of a conspirator. I smile back a knowing smile.

“Good stuff, huh?”

I feel like a junkie who’s just scored a kid his first hit.

Since he’s able to recall every arcane detail about the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods, I’m tempted to tell him that these are Blue Bottle beans, voted by some to be the finest coffee beans roasted in San Francisco, home brewed on our Rancilio espresso machine.

Instead, I just let him hold my cup as Leiopleurodon makes his way further into the deep.

*I submitted this entry to the writingmamas.com blog. Hopefully it's in the queue for next week.

Writing, School, Camping

Dawn Yun, the leader of my Writing Mamas writer's group at Book Passage, has just launched a website: www.writingmamas.com. Check it out if you're curious to see what I/we've been up to. I've submitted one piece; I hope to submit more soon. (Yours truly is also in a photo.)

In other news, Dane's still enjoying kindergarten (will post pix as soon as I can download them) and Mick took his last final at 2pm today. Done with quarter #5. This one just sort of snuck up on us!

We're going camping this weekend at Mackerricher State Park, about three hours north of here; will pull Dane out at lunchtime tomorrow and start driving. Bringing bikes, kite, s'more fixins.