Following Elias

May Your Path Be Your Own

“Mom, is God real?”

Olive and I are driving along Turnagain Arm, where the mountains leap from the water on either side of the Seward Highway, that winds between rock and water, a once-in-a-lifetime ride for many and for us our corridor between homes.

Is God real?

As the sun dances across the sky, reflecting both shadow and light upon peaks and ridges, waves and sandbars, I see beauty everywhere.

Is it divine?

I don’t know.

I am not a believer. But I am not an atheist.

I am ambivalent.

I didn't grow up going to church, as my parents, who felt forced to attend when they were young, decided to let my brother and I find our own path to God. And so my trail is free of absolutes, it is not a straight road but more of a wandering one with many paths.

I answer my six-year-old daughter in the only way I know how: “ I don't know for sure babe, I think it depends on what you believe. Do you think God is real?”

“Yes.”

“Then God is real.”

We pass mountain goats high up on the cliffs, cars pulled over on the side, people standing and looking up, cameras held high.

“I think I’ll ask Grandma and Pop that question. Because they go to church.”

“Good idea,” I say, thinking of Nick's parents singing in the praise band of their Methodist congregation. “They might be able to give you a better answer.”

And yet there’s more to my answer.

There’s that feeling I had on the ferry, when we crossed into Alaskan waters, my first time in this state, that’s now been my home for 16 years, and the northern lights greeted us, and I stood on the deck with my neck craned back, repeating: “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god….”

When I knew something far greater than me, a force I couldn't name or explain, held my small life, like cupped hands holding the last batch of sacred water.

Or when Nick and I reached the top of Cody Pass together, just the two of us surrounded by sky and mountains, and he smiled at me wth those blue eyes in a way that told me he liked me too. The way my heart held its breath, and time paused, so all that fit in the frame, all that mattered, was us, and this feeling we shared, both intimate and universal all at once.

Or when the California Honeydrops took over the stage at Salmonfest, on a sunny August day, and I danced with Nick, and friends who are like family, and a crowd full of Alaskans who might as well be family too, as we are all a community of seekers, and I felt the pulse of our collective heartbeats, and thought to myself: If I die in this moment it will have been enough.

That feeling.

Or when Olive, and Elias before her, crawl into bed with me at night, and I wake to see their sleeping faces before mine, our breath intertwined, their features so perfect in their restful pose, so complete and whole, and from me but not mine, and I stay with this vision, this realization, for a second or two, before the daily doings begin, and I lose the purity of the moment.

I try to explain what this feeling is to my daughter.

“Olive, I guess I believe God is in everything and everywhere like—“

“Like maybe he’s George Washington. Or our president now…Obama?”

I smile from my driver’s seat and say, “Well, maybe, those are real people, one who lived a long time ago and ones who's still alive today. I think god is in all of us and also in the mountains and the rivers and the trees and all of nature. I mean, look around Olive, look how beautiful it is all around us.”

A bald eagle circles the beach and Olive says: “And in birds?”

“Yep, birds and moose and even bears.”

“Can we listen to Queen, Mommy?”

And just like that we move from the divine to musical royalty, as we roll down the highway towards Seward and Lowell Point and our clearing that looks out over Resurrection Bay.

Later that evening, as we walk around our house site, overwhelmed by all there is to do, Olive discovers our “special” rock pile, collected over many beach walks, some striped, some heart shaped, some round like eggs.

Olive scrapes a quartz rock against a flat piece of broken shale and says: “Mommy look I can write with this rock.”

“Cool,” I say, distracted by my own thoughts of the four of us living in a trailer in the woods.

Then Olive pulls me back to the moment, the only place that really matters, when she says: “Mommy, I’m writing my name on this rock because I want nature to know me.”

In other news...

I actually like my son again.

I mean, I like spending time with my twelve-year-old boy who for the past six weeks has been more sunshine, less storm.

Instead of a hail of violent eruptions, we've been getting rays of positivity.

Pleases and thank you's. Smiles and  "Sure, I'll do that."

Instead of greeting us daily with opposition he's been meeting us with humor and light.

The other day he came home from the ARC, where he attends a summer program for kids with special needs, having bought a small teddy bear with his own money at a thrift store.

"Here Mom, I got this for you."

"Ah, thank you Bud," I said, as I helped him get his stuff our of the ARC van. "I'm touched you thought of me. Ya know, I know who would really like it. What about giving it to Olive?"

"No."

"Ok. I just know she would really appreciate this little bear, especially knowing her big brother bought it for her with his own money."

And just like that, the magic spell we've been under stayed strong, as he said, "Ok. Where is she?"

So, as we pack for a week away in Seward, I wanted you all to know my bags are feeling light. And my heart is hopeful that the worst of the storm has passed.

(But don't worry, you know me, I'm packed for all kinds of weather, just in case.)

Happy weekend all!

Brackish Water

We are in that place in-between, the no-man's land of change, pushed and pulled by opposing forces, the part that wants to stay with all that's warm and familiar and the part that wants to travel into the unknown.

Boxes lay scattered around our living spaces, signs of a pending move, and yet I still find myself planting Petunias and Lobelia in the pots by my front door. As I walk around the yard, I'm torn between a desire to improve my current flower beds and dig up plants for Seward, to bring to my imagined gardens on the property where we do not yet have a home.

Its hard to leave the comfort of this house, the one we moved into two weeks after Olive's birth, with the world's best neighbors, and a new bakery two doors down. Our neighborhood comes alive in the summer, with kids on bikes and couples walking dogs and endless impromptu social gatherings on the sidewalk, in driveways, playing catch in the middle of the road.

We love this place.

And we feel called to the woods, to the mountainside overlooking Resurrection Bay, to endless miles of remote wilderness as our backyard and a small town only two miles away.

I have to believe we will find another tribe amidst the hardy folks of Seward, and yet I wish I could bring my current one with me. I wish I could transport this house and these flowers and these neighbors and friends--bring them all with us so that moving wasn't so hard.

"Mom, I don't want to move to Seward," Olive cried to me the other night before bed. "I'm going to be sad."

"I know Babe, me too." I kissed her forehead.

"I don't want to live in the woods."

Olive's words tightened around my heart like the grip of my boy who doesn't realize he's squeezing too hard-- for Nick and I often wonder if what feels right for us will be the right move for our family of four.

"It will be different, Olive. But it will be an adventure."

"But I'm scared of bears."

Bears don't scare me as much as the weight of making decisions that affect the people I love. This power we hold as parents to alter our children's worlds on the spin of a dime, on a longing, on a leap, on the bare thread of hope that we are doing it right.

And there are bears in those woods.

But I told Olive I've been going to David's property for 15 years and I've never seen a bear by his house and between the dogs and the amount of noise we make the bears would be more scared of us. 

"But Mom, can all the bedrooms be up on the second floor? Because bears can't get upstairs."  

And just like that the lasso around my heart loosens, as I realize she's worried about her big brother Elias--her nemesis, her mirror, her shadow, her light-- with his projected room downstairs, as all our imagined house plans have him on the first floor due to his mobility issues.

We compromise by promising to lock the door of the house that is yet to be built, on the land we still have to finish clearing, that holds the next chapter for this family of mine.

I can't read ahead.

All I can do is be here in this messy place between what's known and what's to come, this boundary space with its brackish water and endless boxes waiting to be filled.

And I can pack patience, hope, grief, and of course, love alongside the pottery and linens.

Freeze Frame

We are in the kitchen, as always, getting ready for school.

Olive lays on the bench with her feet against the wall. "Mom, did you know Frances said the s word."

"Oh yeah?"

Does she mean shit?

"Yeah, at recess yesterday," Olive says, looking at me with a six-year-old's serious eyes.

I place the only thing my daughter will eat in the mornings, the oh-so-healthy cinnamon and sugar on toast, on the table before her and say: "Well, she just didn't make a good choice with her words."

"Yeah, and she said the h word too."

H, I'm stumped, h, um, hell..?

After a sip of coffee I say: "Olive, can you whisper to me the h word."

Olive's eyes light up as she sits up and leans towards my ear: "Hate."

"Oh, and what's the s word?"

Olive cradles her hands around her mouth and softly says: "Stupid."

And my heart wants to hold her here, in this moment, when "hate" and "stupid" are the dirtiest of words, not to be spoken with a loud voice.

A nasty verb and insulting adjective with no place on my daughter's playground.

 

Stay here sweet one.

 

And later in the same day.

Olive pauses in her dance around the kitchen and says: "Mom, guess what Fiona said?"

"What?"

She smiles and sings: "Olive and Zeke sitting in a tree, k, I, S, S...what's the rest of it?"

Without a pause I answer: "I, N, G."

And just like that I am back on the monkey bars, a scabby kneed girl with a pixie haircut singing: First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes a baby in a baby carriage...

"Yeah, thats it." Olive tilts her head to the side and asks, "Is that mean?"

"Well, how did you feel when she said it?"

Her face is a warm sea, nothing but sunshine and blue sky: "Oh, Zeke and I laughed. Fiona is so funny." 

"Then no, its not mean."

 

 

And even later, Olive swings in our Birch and sings the age old playground Sitting-in-a-Tree song, the same one I sang back at Baldwin Elementary in Watertown CT in the 1970's, in the way she currently understands it: 

"Olive and Zeke sitting in a tree, K -I -S -S -I -N -G, first comes love, then comes marriage, then comes babysitting..."

Oh, Olive, so true.

 

Tomorrow is Olive's last day as a kindergartener.

Elias's last day in elementary school.

My last day as the kids' counselor.

And besides a final Friday for me to pack my office, our last day at Airport Heights Elementary.

I can't freeze time.

But I wouldn't mind if this last day fell long and slooooow.

 

So It Goes

"Mom, I decided iPads are boring because you just sit there and press the screen," Olive says as she drives her play trailer around the kitchen.

"I love that you decided that." I crack an egg to go with my roasted veggies for dinner. The kids' GF pizza bakes as we talk.

"Why does Elias always want to do his iPad instead of play with toys? Its so boring, you just do this." Olive pretends to be pushing buttons on an imaginary screen. "That's all he wants to do is his iPad."

Elias, thankfully, is in a different room changing out of a wet pull-up. On his own. Its the little changes we embrace.

I look down at my daughter as she sets up the miniature table in the toy trailer, putting out plates for the plastic cats that call it home. "Well, creative play is hard for your brother. You know that his brain works a little differently, right?"

Olive nods. And for once I would like to be in my daughter's mind and see our family through her chocolate eyes.

Earlier in the day, as usual, it was Elias's head I wanted to pry open and peek inside. After a stretch of positivity, he woke this morning in tears and declared: "I'm not going to school today."

"Well, Olive and I are going-- so I hope you'll join us," I said. With Nick In Seward for work for a few days, I was already wondering how I was going to get both kids to school with me for a 7:30 meeting.

"No, there's no school today," Elias stated. " Mr. Webb said there was no school today."

"Really?"

"Yes, he told me at lunch."

"That's interesting since I work there and he's my boss and he didn't tell me." This is not the first time Elias has insisted that our principal told him school was cancelled. And he will get stuck on it, as if saying it twenty times will make it true. It cracks me up and infuriates me all at once because mornings are hard enough without fiction delivered as gospel.

I took a sip of my coffee and said: "Elias you have eight days left and its a beautiful day, lets just please enjoy it."

"That's why there's no school today," Elias said as he rubbed his eyes. "Its too sunny for school."

"You're funny," I said and I'd be laughing if he wasn't crying and serious in his desire to stay home.

So after multiple refusals to get dressed I told him, "Fine you can stay home but I'm going to walk Olive to school and explain why I'm missing the meeting and then I'll come back to check on you. I hope your dressed when we return."

And out the front door we walked.

Leaving Elias home alone, for perhaps his first time ever--and I left not knowing if I'd return to mayhem, to a boy unglued.

Luckily, I live around the corner from school and can walk there in an easy five-minutes, so I'm sure I was back in less than fifteen, and as miracles go, he sat on the same bench where I left him, fully dressed.

After a breakfast of salmon salad on gluten-free bread, he walked out the door with me. I walked to the gate and looked back to see him standing by one of the front flower beds "Don't you want to stay home and garden all day?"

I didn't say: "Yes, of course I do, its gorgeous out and I have yet to fully get my hands in the dirt-- but I have this social obligation to work that doesn't allow me to follow my brain wherever it leads. What is that like Elias, to live within your own norms?"

What I said was: "Thats what summers for Bud and we are eight days away."

"Right, I'm just getting distracted by the garden." Elias said and almost happily walked with me. We made it to the corner where we looked for cars before crossing the street and talked about Fire Island Bakery as we passed, as we do every day: Is the bakery open today? Not today.

As we walked past the school grounds, Elias said, "See there are no kids out."

"Its still early."

And then his cane got caught in some netting from the construction and Elias said, "See even the netting is telling me not to go to school today."

I laughed and he laughed and we both walked through the construction tunnel to school with smiles on our faces.

And now I sit here at the kitchen table, with both my children asleep, free to be in my own head, but wondering about theirs.

 

So it goes, motherhood.

So it goes...

Since I Last Wrote...

Buds have burst into a sea of green, as leaves emerge on our countless trees; the sun stays up past 10:00 pm and rises before six in the morning.

Our kids stay up past bedtime, playing outside in the spring light, and wake up tired for school, but with only ten days left till summer break we can muddle our way through the grouchy running-behind mornings knowing that soon the start of our day will slow down, as schedules slip away, replaced by the open air of summer vacation.

A vacation that will involve packing and moving from Anchorage to Seward, a little bit at at a time, as we travel back and forth over the summer months, with plans to be there full time come August.

 

Since I last wrote, I submitted fifteen pages of a manuscript to the faculty of the Kachamak Bay Writer's Conference and attended rehearsal for next week's Arctic Entries storytelling event. After struggling with what to focus on for the conference submission, starting and deleting multiple drafts, my Dad asked, "Well, what have you been thinking about lately? Maybe it would be therapeutic for you to write about whatever's on your mind?"

God I love my Dad.

I hung up with my parents, threw my notebook in a backpack, and headed to the Chugach Mountain Range. I hiked up Flattop and sat against a rock and wrote. I wrote about Elias's meltdowns and how they affect Olive and the fire that arises in me when my growing boy lashes out, claws drawn. I wrote and I wrote and I combined these penned words with some former blog posts to create an essay about the darker side of parenting a child with special needs. And as usual, I felt much lighter when I was done.

 

Since I last wrote, Elias has not erupted. Not once. No wild banshee in our living room. No mad screaming: "I want to hurt you!" We are going on three weeks now of a household truce without swinging arms and mayhem. Of course, as I type these words, I think: There I go again jinxing the tranquility. And if it is hormonal, then we would be due for the monthly surge right about now. But I'll take the calm before the storm, or even better, no wild winds and torrential rain in the forecast. And if/when it comes, we'll hold on to each other and try to keep from falling down.

 

Since I last wrote, the state of Alaska decided that Elias no longer qualifies for services under the Child with Complex Medical Needs waiver. "Wow he's high functioning, " the state nurse said back in January when she walked into our house for an assessment. And I wanted to shake her and let her know that just because he can walk and talk does not mean he can survive out in the world without supports. If we lose this waiver we would lose funding for his after school program and respite services. So yes, we will appeal, we will fill out more forms and jump through more flaming hoops while painting the worst possible picture of our son. But we wont like it. Not one bit.

 

 

Since I last wrote, our beloved Ms. Julia, Elias's Respite Worker since third grade, and Teacher Assistant from first through third, has moved from Alaska to Virginia. She has been gone for a week and I already feel the black hole in our family structure. She was who I could call anytime to help for an evening out or a weekend away. She was like a second grandmother to Elias and one he never had to share with his sister. She came with a loving husband, Fred, and son Desi who also doted on my boy.

I excepted the meltdowns to begin with her impending departure, but in typical Elias fashion he focused on her airplane flights and schedules and spoke with excitement about her upcoming travel plans-- and I am still waiting for the reality of this loss to hit him. If it even does. As my boy's ability to adapt never ceizes to amaze me, even as he resists change. He seems to stay in the present instead of dwelling on what might have been.

 

Since I last wrote we celebrated Elias's 12th anniversary of his homecoming day. The day we finally left the NICU and brought our baby boy home. A day when I wanted nothing more than to lie in my own bed and hold my son, without the fluorescent lights of a hospital shining down upon us. No doctors or nurses. Just a mother and a child.

We celebrated with a fire pit and neighbors, the kids taking turns on the swings, climbing our giant birch tree, playing wiffle ball in the yard long past bedtime, staying up with the sun. After the kids finally went down, Nick and I sat by the fire talking about all the places we've been and all the changes to come.

 

 

Since I last wrote, I missed writing here.

Happy Friday All!