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Learning and trying to be kind and living my life as fully as I can stand it.

Thursday, May 19, 2016

PW, part 2 unedited again

If you had told me that one day Phyllis, or PW as some of us called her, would be folding piles of my kids' laundry on my dining room table, I would not have believed you. Not because I wouldn't expect her to do something kind and helpful like that but because. . .I mean. It's like the coolest girl in school offering to come over and fold your laundry. Wait, no. Not the coolest girl in school. The coolest, young teacher at school who you love talking to and learning from and want some day to be like and can maybe some days imagine being friends with because you have a connection and if she weren't a grown up and you weren't a kid and. . . .yeah, it just never would have crossed my mind. I can tell you that I'm not the only one who feels this way because when I mention to some colleagues, the ones who have worked there for a long time and who worked with and for Phyllis, that she is home watching my kids they look at me as though I just said "Oh yeah, Sting came over to babysit today."

Not exaggerating.

There are so many things to say. I already described what it was like to have her as a boss. It would be another essay entirely to describe what it was like, organizationally and professionally and personally for many people, when she retired so I won't do that here. I can say that we have been friends for years--sharing books (well, mostly she brings me books) and going to Giants games (she took me to Giants games) and talking about love and friendship and travel and work. About motherhood and how much I wanted to be a mother.

We had one another's phone numbers after she left and we stayed in touch, going out to dinner (she took me to dinner). Sometimes we talked about work and I always wanted to know her opinion about things, especially when I was a manager and struggled with so many different aspects of the role. She always kept her commentary about work brief. I could tell she missed it. I could tell she had opinions she wasn't sharing. We never got deep into the dissection of challenges or practice changes or people. She was a mentor and a dear friend. She came to our wedding. She bought us china.

Somehow she started coming to my house once a week after the big twins were born. Was it once a week back then? I can barely remember anything but if not once a week, close to it. She is a loving grandmother to two girls who are growing up and she was happy to spend time with some little babies. She was already coming when I got pregnant with the little girls and noticed how wan and exhausted I was, before I knew the reason why. She just kept coming, holding babies, helping, taking care of us.

The littles are almost two and she has rarely missed a week. Every Tuesday she drives across the Bay, bringing me coffee, lunch for the whole family, snacks and treats for the kids. She was always a great dresser at work and she somehow manages to have the same style now but in clothes that can be muddied and streaked with paint and snot and everything else that propagates our house and covers those eight little hands. She changes diaper and diaper. She climbs into the back of the minivan to load kids in and out of those hard-to-reach car seats. She reads and plays and takes kids to the playground, puts them down for naps, talks to them. They call her Aunt P, or Auntie P, and they not only love her they expect her and ask for her and position themselves temporally in the week based on when she is coming. My husband and I absolutely do not know what we would have done or would do without her.

When I started working at the donor network again she not only wanted to keep coming on Tuesdays but she offered to go solo--to watch all four kids alone, all day. Let that sink in. There is nothing I have ever done in my life that is more exhausting than taking care of my four kids. At the end of the day I flop onto the couch and do not want to get up, not even for food or water. I am done. The only other people who take care of them alone are Stephanie, our babysitter, and Haku, our other babysitter. I was worried about Phyllis when she said she would do this and gave her as many windows as I could to change her mind or back out. She hasn't yet. And though I worried, I knew absolutely that she could do it. She's PW. She can do anything I think.

All of this is to say how much we love her and appreciate her. But I haven't said yet how hard it has been for me to, slow by slow, relax into the reality of having this person whom I admire so hugely come into the most exposed version of myself. The true truth. The mess, the food stains and poop and crazy hair and no bra and dirty clothes and crazed eyes. The rawness of how hard this life is with all these kids. It took many many months, more than a year, for me to stop feeling like I needed to entertain her and talk to her and treat her like a guest. That was hard hard hard for me to do. We keep peeling back layers, talking about death and the hard parts of marriage and health issues. We have been friends for years but this is something different. Family is a good word for it but it's something different than that too. I'm not sure I have the word for it yet, just the feeling.

But Tuesday, when I was practically overcome with rage at the shit on the floor, at the overall powerlessness of my role as a mother, I had moments of wishing her away. Not wanting her, or anyone, to see how ugly I could get. How miserable. How mad. I stalked around, I hid. I was tempted to release her, to release myself, by suggesting that she leave. At one point, even after I was mostly calmed down, I came back out to the living room where she was folding laundry and huffed "Well motherhood doesn't live up to the dreams I had about it!"

She didn't say much but and she didn't get scared away. We didn't have a big talk about it and we mostly moved in symphony for the next little while until she left. But the next day she sent me this text:

"Keep thinking how hard you are working at being a good mom. You don't give yourself enough credit for handling an overwhelming responsibility. I just wish you had more time to spend with them one on one. Lily is never going to let anyone take advantage of her; Cyrus will be the love of life for so many people; Cleo will be that great observer and then will throw herself into things full force; Daphne will always have that cute smile on her face and will get away with a lot because of it. They are amazing kids and you are responsible for that."

This is my love letter to her, to PW, Auntie P, to Phyllis. To my friend, my mentor, my boss. The gifts you give and have given will stay with me, have lifted me, continue to save me and humble me.

Thank you forever.




4 comments:

  1. Of all the EDs for whom I never worked, Phyllis is probably my favorite. I didn't know her very well, but what I did know of her was delightful. Your revelations here reinforce what I long suspected to be true. Thank you for sharing!

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    1. You are another good egg in this small world of ours PJ.

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  2. Tears here for the love all around, the support you have and deserve, for how hard it is, and for being brave and open enough to write it down and share it.

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