Late night musings of an eternal mamma

I give her little face a kiss and she tucks her head into the crook of my neck. I smell like a mama, she smells strongly of bubbles and strawberries, a result of her affinity to sneaking the soap bar when she's fully clean and my hastiness to pull the tub stopper as the water gets chilly.

I knelt by the tub tonight, watching her soap her own toes and firmly refusing to brush her teeth. I swept a washcloth behind her ears, under her curvy chin, and wondered: how long she will need me yet? As I scooped water into the palm of my hand to rinse the day away, I glimpsed a bigger girl with memories and stories to spill out, with an eagerness and lightness of her father's and a the voice of a dreamer like me. Her hair swirled down around the top of her neck in a way I had never seen it do before, tracing rivulets down her spine and joining the bath again. My heart whispered: will I always know her this well?

The night is long at times, spent shuffling (those ever growing) little feet back under the blankets and getting up for water, worrying over my two dearest loves as they sleep, as if they were both my children, and I suppose in a very primal way they are. Both are sound in my nest all night, tucked around one another and oblivious to this mama's dually committed heart thrumming away, wanting to hold them both at once.

I fear her growing because I'm terrified I haven't got it down. I want longer to get it right before she will know that I am misguided, before she sees my faults. Eventually I'm sure she will recognize me as a pawn. I don't know the rules. I don't know the steps, I can't dance this fast and in these shoes.

As I scooped her from the tub and she pressed her face into the crook of my neck, we went in search of pajamas for the night. Pulling from the basket nearest me, I found my fingers wrapped around a tiny set of pajamas too small for any girl of mine. These were hers nearly two winters ago, just as we were seated deep in worry about our future, cold and jobless with no hope or vision for that to change, when there were too many hours each day spent sitting in classrooms waiting to graduate so I could hold my daughter whenever I pleased; hoping that my classmates didn't see my breasts leaking, at times wondering that they did not smell my fear that this route they celebrated with joy I counted as hell and yearned for it to end.

Darker hours in the shivering winter spent fighting with Pappa because my heart was never in school again, I could spare it all just to be a mamma. These were the pajamas she wore the morning we drove to the polls to vote for idealistic "Change," and the morning my sweet friend Jessy came to visit after her weekly Chemo battering. She smiled and yet looked faint, she sang to my wee babe about teething gums while I worried about my girl, who had immediately fixed herself on this splendid friend to investigate her thoroughly- I hope that my own girl will be as open-minded, loving and generous each step of the way as this beautiful young woman I am blessed to know.

This instinct to protect is not exclusive to the faces we see and love each day. It is not limited to the hands we hold or gently scold, and the tiny feet that pitter-patter and sometimes "THRUMP!" around, making tangible progress and marking the traits that will be theirs for life right before our eyes. It is for the children we don't get to hold, the ones we were ourselves, the ones we see on the television while their mother's wail. These children, these little sparks that flash for only a moment, that always have to face the cold with empty tummies, they are why my heart is breaking for my own. I stood in front of my mother when I was seven and told her I wanted to save all of the orphans, and asked her why we didn't try to help. Her reasoning was complicated and altogether simple at the same moment, yet her theory fell deaf to my ears and I am sure that day I stopped believing in universal love.

This is the joy called motherhood, I share it with many strong and willing women now, and before me. Surely more will come after me as well. Some bear a multitude of souls into the world and some never kiss a single tear frosted cheek, but all have willing, loving, open hearts. We swap tips and laughs and fears. We all dream big, and none of us wants our children to resist our open arms. This is the joy called motherhood. It is the voice of universal love.

Do something kind for another person today. Do it for your heart, and mine, which needs reminding that humanity is always embraced by mothers.

101

My last post was my 100th post. I didn't even notice it. I guess that goes to show how fast things are moving these days. It's been feeling almost balmy here and this is such a wonderful thing because I was feeling so blue to be cooped up indoors all day every day. I'm sure it will not last, though when we were further East it certainly felt Springlike much sooner in the winter and I can't tell you how much I loved the way the city would fill our apartment in the winter. It made being inside seem like being just behind the curtain on stage to hear the rattling of the trucks on the freeway echoiing into our little space, filling the walls with the humming noises of someone else's adventure.
Little Berry loves being out of doors with me, brings me her shoes and my own, her jacket, the keys, just to get my attention that she wants to go walk. When it's bitter cold though she doesn't want anything to do with it, and squalls to be picked up so she can tuck her face into my neck and poke the freckles on the side of my face. She calls them each a "ball" though, or somedays, "murse?" which is Little Berry for nurse and I have no idea why she thinks my freckles are going to yield milk.
I'm in desperate want of a bicycle, I want a lovely vintage style one that's on display at Target and a sweet baby carrier that goes behind the seat. I've been spying on them at the Thrift stores and have found a few contenders but they all need work and they're not that much less than a new one here. So I'm saving my dollars and waiting, and when Spring comes and I have a summer to look forward to on flat roads of rural Mississippi (or Arkansas, who knows?) I will buy my bike and buckle in my Little Berry who by then will be quite a BIG Little Berry, and we will ride.
We're having that language explosion age, I've been warned about it before but it just slipped away from me that this is what's happening, until this morning I was putting laundry on the clothesline and she was standing a few feet away pointing at the sky and saying skyyyyeeeee? followed by burrrrd? 'reeeee? (tree)and turtle? In the past week or so, she's learned mouse, and keys, and socks (shocksh?) and cow as well as that cow's go Mooooo?! and points to their udders and says "Murse?". She can say Pig (pigsh!), which sounds a lot like her enthusiastic "fish!" and snort when she sees their picture. She spots airplanes in the sky that look like mere pinpricks in the clouds and shrieks about them until they've again faded into the mystery that is a cloud. This morning I was telling her something and I said the word "one"- I think I said "oops! That's only one shoe." And she said: "Two?" but she usually gets pretty lost after four.
I have two pieces to her little kitchen set painted a pretty white, and am waiting to paint the last, the stove. It is somewhat tedious because my minutes to do it are spare but the reward is great. She loves it immensely and has been pilfering from my silverware drawer every few minutes to play whatever games it is that gets her so wrapped up and immersed in taking things out and putting things back in again. I've decided to try my hand at making toy food for her. I have plenty of felt wool but I don't like the feel of wool toys enough to do that, so I've decided to use pre-knitted fabrics, like organic cotton sweaters I picked up at the thrift stores in heavy weight yarns and cut them apart to make them from. I will post photos of this when I'm done as well as a tutorial if I succeed.
Here's something to think about until I post again:
Which is cutest?
Little Berry, last January


OR: Little Berry this week

From the "archives"

Here are some pictures from this time last year. The first is of Inauguration night at the Governors party. We had just heard that Obama won.

It was so, so loud in that room. Perdue won as well and everyone was laughing, whooping, some crying. It was exciting for us as a family.
This second photo was taken at UNC as Pappa Starbucks picked me up on a friday afternoon. Have you been there in the fall before? It is so beautiful. Springtime, too.

Do you see this precious purple face?
We were struggling so hard with thrush and a cranky baby those days. Today she's well and instead of purple gentian violet stain...


Toothies.