m&ms
How was my weekend, you asked?
Unexpected missives bearing witness to a dozen tragedies and comedies which took place in the hallowed halls of the office, the snow soaked commutes to kindergarten and lacrosse. The time you and you and you got the phone call from the doctor's office--let's wait a month and try again; gulp, it was positive. The frantic five minutes before daycare closed and the damn red light and it was less the the fact that the irritated daycare worker would grimace as she passed your child to you (adding one dollar for each additional minute after, and more that her resentment might translate into some barely percetible slight got her graham cracker later than everyone else (oh and the ridiculousness of these first world problems which, by the way, is no longer something funny to say, your college sophomore would like to point out). The missed opportunity to go to D.C. The point that the focus on the time at the margins of parenting and work (8:55 a.m. on the 9 a.m. elevator, 5:20 on every expressway in the commonwealth; cite-checking the brief with a feverish toddler combing your hair through with her pedialyte fingers)--these are the ties that bind.
Unexpected missives bearing witness to a dozen tragedies and comedies which took place in the hallowed halls of the office, the snow soaked commutes to kindergarten and lacrosse. The time you and you and you got the phone call from the doctor's office--let's wait a month and try again; gulp, it was positive. The frantic five minutes before daycare closed and the damn red light and it was less the the fact that the irritated daycare worker would grimace as she passed your child to you (adding one dollar for each additional minute after, and more that her resentment might translate into some barely percetible slight got her graham cracker later than everyone else (oh and the ridiculousness of these first world problems which, by the way, is no longer something funny to say, your college sophomore would like to point out). The missed opportunity to go to D.C. The point that the focus on the time at the margins of parenting and work (8:55 a.m. on the 9 a.m. elevator, 5:20 on every expressway in the commonwealth; cite-checking the brief with a feverish toddler combing your hair through with her pedialyte fingers)--these are the ties that bind.
It was a weekend where the onslaught of delicious food continued without interruption: the carefully folded paper thin packets of spanakopita, the braised meatball with shreds of Parmesan, the frozen Mexican food delivered overnight from your street in New York to mine, the lucious brownie studded with salt caramel, the thin slices of radish and pears in the spinach salad. All this delicious, perfect food which has enabled my whole sprawling family to eat on the non-stop basis to which living with me has convinced them is normal.
It was hours of naps. My sister scooping up my children into her car so they could jump pell mell into her neighbor's pool, the sneaked bottles of lemonade vodka to the "old" kids, the waking up in my room, to see my father patiently dosing off, waiting for me to chat and realize neither of us have ever gotten over the end of "Easy Rider."
It was the very very late night exchanges about clinical trials, and the meaning of "median," again, and the surfaced "disagreements" about overnight camp and bar mitzvahs and weddings in back yards that should emerge in real time, and how it is that I have never articulated what I want to be done with my body when I die, or how to efficiently condense the important answers to unasked questions into some tautological, acronym-driven learning tool, guaranteed to make sure my daughters never get into the wrong car, my sons miss the wrong plane connection, somehow find themselves out there amongst strangers (except we already know I have already failed at this magic, never could have succeeded, in drawing a line between us and the world).
It was the very very late night exchanges about clinical trials, and the meaning of "median," again, and the surfaced "disagreements" about overnight camp and bar mitzvahs and weddings in back yards that should emerge in real time, and how it is that I have never articulated what I want to be done with my body when I die, or how to efficiently condense the important answers to unasked questions into some tautological, acronym-driven learning tool, guaranteed to make sure my daughters never get into the wrong car, my sons miss the wrong plane connection, somehow find themselves out there amongst strangers (except we already know I have already failed at this magic, never could have succeeded, in drawing a line between us and the world).
There is not an ounce of cynicism in me when I thank you for caring about my family this weekend and thank you for the extraordinary experience of finding myself known.
I'm hoping treatment starts this week. The medicine is ordered through a special pharmacy, and I'm expecting it to show up in a little white box, looking like personalized m&ms.
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