January 3, 2016

Like a vampire, or a drug addict, I feed off my children. Leaving them behind tugs at my heart or some deeper part of my anatomy and makes it hard to keep going. And then I'm lost, practically turning in circles as I try to figure out what to do with this free childless time.

In September I spent eleven nights in the hospital. . .and everyone survived. Much more than survived. My children looked so happy every time they came to see me. Part of it was gladness to see me but beyond that they looked peaceful and well-loved and full. One night alone I stood naked at my hospital window overlooking Buchanan Street, seeing the reflection of my body against the city lights shining dully in the glass. I was familiar, when I gazed upon myself. I have been looking at this face, this body, in mirrors or bathtubs or windows all my life. I will be me, alone in myself, for every day for the rest of my life no matter what I do. Sometimes that feels lonely. Sometimes it feels like coming home.

Lately I've felt desperate to get away from my kids. Counting down until bedtime, which is no longer easy now that the two-year-olds know how to climb out of their cribs. My husband and I look at each other, dead-eyed and going through the motions, waiting waiting waiting to get a break. And then I miss them. It's a fucked up dance, this parenting song.

We are trying something new. Each of us gets a day of the weekend--he is Saturday, I am Sunday. This is our day to do whatever we want. Today is my first day like this. I woke up and went to yoga, stretching my tight muscles to the sky, enjoying the invitation of focus into individual movement. It was hard and blissful. A reminder that yoga makes me so much better. The breathing. The community. The quiet. The practice of coming back to myself again and again. The class ended, I walked outside, and I felt. . .lost again. Didn't know what to do with myself, where to go. An almost panic set in, wanting to make the most of the free time. . .and feeling drawn back to my children, to my family. I came back home and took a sweet-smelling bubble bath before they returned from the park. Seeing their faces beaming at me filled me up. Five minutes later I was ready to leave again.

Yesterday, on my husband's day, I took the kids out of the house to spend the day in San Francisco so that he could work on projects at home. Puttering is his therapy, his coming home to himself. My city greeted me like the friend and cozy turtleneck sweater that it is. Driving familiar streets with my kids noticing the people and trucks and lights and dogs of urban life made me feel good. I dropped my eldest off with my mom for some one-on-one Nana time and took the other three to a park on top of a hill where we met an old, beloved friend of mine from high school, his beautiful fiancee and their son. The three of us wove together like a braid, handing off children and viewpoints. Eating croissants and peeling tangerines. At one point she asked me if I'd been writing much.

No, I said. And it's not that I can't find the time. It's that I hate everything I have to say.

That's how it is with making things, she said.

It was a benediction.