My cousin told me after meeting her newborn niece Sarah for the first time that she "loved her like she didn't know was possible." And while I kind of agree that at the time it sounded like a cliche thing to say (no offense WB) I could now not agree more.
On Friday, July 25 my first niece was born: Sophia Louise. She is healthy and happy and looks just like my brother. I am overjoyed by her birth. In fact, I am overwhelmed by the emotions I have experienced in the last 72 hours since her birth. Forgetting for a second that I spent more than half my weekend in airports stressed and tired, hungry and anxious, these emotions were different from the ones I have known before. I found myself tearing up when my dad would send me a picture message of "Grandma" holding her. During a short phone conversation with my sister-in-law, I found myself sobbing because little Sophia started to cry. Hearing her 'voice' for the first time, over the phone, over thousands of miles both warmed and broke my heart. It is the sweetest and most tender of times, but it is also the most painful of times. I want to be near her; I want to be with her; I want to hold her tiny hands and kiss her soft head. I want to know her in this fragile, helpless and adorable stage. But I don't get to. And that breaks my heart in more ways than I thought it would. I've known for quite some time that she will only live in Las Vegas for a few months; then she and her family will move across the globe to Korea. That's a fact of life, a fact of life in the Air Force. But now that she has been born that fact is more like a tiny knife piercing my saddened heart. I am overjoyed by her life, by her presence in our lives yet, am saddened by her departure, by her proximity.
I haven't met her yet, and probably won't for a few months but I love her...more than I thought I would. I love her in a way I don't think I love anything else. It's not in the same way in which I love my parents, my brothers, my dog, my friends or even my boyfriend(s) of past and present. It transcends that. The weird thing is, I can't explain it. But I can feel it. And it is so powerful. I find myself looking at my blackberry throughout the day just to see her beautiful round face. I talk about her to people with such pride and such joy; the same kind of pride once reserved only for my dog. I adore her. And yet, I do not know her. It is abstract in many ways, yet palpable in so many others.
My mom has told me for years that I cannot comprehend the kind of love you have for your own children. She always jokes that I should think about the love I have for my dog and multiply that by 10,000 and then even still, I won't understand the kind of love she has for me, or my brother I'm certain, has for his newborn daughter. And although I haven't yet met Sophia, I think I'm starting to comprehend just how strong that love is and can be. Once I do finally meet her, I'm sure this love will only multiply by the thousands.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Headlock
When I was growing up, my family always spent a few weeks every summer in West Palm Beach, Florida where my grandfather and his wife lived. We hated going there, from what I can remember. It was incredibly boring, having to spend so much time sitting around in a house that smelled like mildew and old people. There was a strange saltwater pool at his country club, where sometimes we were allowed to go and play. There was also a bathing suit ringer at this club that looked like a torture contraption from the early 18th century.
Rather than swim in the pool like normal children usually would, my brothers and I would attempt to fill the pool with green berries we picked from the bushes lining the pool's edge. We would throw what seemed like thousands into the pool, and sometimes they would push me in and force me to retrieve them. We would also throw the patio furniture into the deep end and then have a pretend picnic complete with pretend food and pretend tea. We loved to throw furniture into pools; there's something incredibly satisfying about watching a table and four or five chairs sink, winding and turning as it drifts effortlessly to the bottom with one last thunk. We would see how long we could hold our breath while hanging onto on the lounge chairs that also got tossed in. One of my brothers always wore a watch with a timer on it that beeped. He always held the record. I could never beat him. He was like a fish, that one.
Eventually, our parents would come by and yell at us for having put the furniture in the pool. They would ask us to get out and change into our clothes for dinner. And so we would move from the pool to the changing-room area where the bathing suit ringer was located. We would then pick aloe plant leaves and run each one through it, cheering as the plant oozed its contents on the barrel of the ringer. We would throw them at each other and we would stab each other with the thorny edges of the leaves. We would leave the ringer covered in slimy green aloe juice and walk away, giggling like the school children that we were. We would leave a trail of disaster when we left that country club; we would leave our family mark.
I have a lot of fond memories just like these, of the days when my brothers and I vacationed together, of when we played together, of when we lived together and shared everything together, not because we necessarily wanted to, but because we had to. Because we were family.
This past weekend I talked to one of my brothers for close to two hours. This is the first time we had talked in several months, not because we don't like each other, but because until a few weeks ago he lived abroad. The time difference and the expense of calling overseas made it difficult to talk often. We talked about many things: the gossip going on in the family, the sad news I had to bear, the confusion that life has handed us, the excitement, the joy, the pain. And although this is the same brother that used to pin me down and fart on my head, or blow burps in my face, the same brother who would wake me up by throwing objects at me from the doorway of my bedroom, this conversation transcended everything up to that point. It was like all of the sudden we stopped being children and put on our adult masks. And it didn't strike me hard until we eventually started talking about very "adult" things: about how best to handle our crazy mother and about him becoming a father, and about true love, romance and bliss. It was then that I realized perhaps for the very first time that we weren't playing pretend. We actually are adults. We are...adults?
Somewhere between West Palm Beach and New York City and Venice Italy we both grew up and became adults. And not that I didn't think it would happen, I just didn't expect it to happen this way. Yet underneath all the confusion and situations that adulthood bestows, I know that if he had the chance, he would headlock me and hold me there until I begrudgingly scream out ...mercy!
Rather than swim in the pool like normal children usually would, my brothers and I would attempt to fill the pool with green berries we picked from the bushes lining the pool's edge. We would throw what seemed like thousands into the pool, and sometimes they would push me in and force me to retrieve them. We would also throw the patio furniture into the deep end and then have a pretend picnic complete with pretend food and pretend tea. We loved to throw furniture into pools; there's something incredibly satisfying about watching a table and four or five chairs sink, winding and turning as it drifts effortlessly to the bottom with one last thunk. We would see how long we could hold our breath while hanging onto on the lounge chairs that also got tossed in. One of my brothers always wore a watch with a timer on it that beeped. He always held the record. I could never beat him. He was like a fish, that one.
Eventually, our parents would come by and yell at us for having put the furniture in the pool. They would ask us to get out and change into our clothes for dinner. And so we would move from the pool to the changing-room area where the bathing suit ringer was located. We would then pick aloe plant leaves and run each one through it, cheering as the plant oozed its contents on the barrel of the ringer. We would throw them at each other and we would stab each other with the thorny edges of the leaves. We would leave the ringer covered in slimy green aloe juice and walk away, giggling like the school children that we were. We would leave a trail of disaster when we left that country club; we would leave our family mark.
I have a lot of fond memories just like these, of the days when my brothers and I vacationed together, of when we played together, of when we lived together and shared everything together, not because we necessarily wanted to, but because we had to. Because we were family.
This past weekend I talked to one of my brothers for close to two hours. This is the first time we had talked in several months, not because we don't like each other, but because until a few weeks ago he lived abroad. The time difference and the expense of calling overseas made it difficult to talk often. We talked about many things: the gossip going on in the family, the sad news I had to bear, the confusion that life has handed us, the excitement, the joy, the pain. And although this is the same brother that used to pin me down and fart on my head, or blow burps in my face, the same brother who would wake me up by throwing objects at me from the doorway of my bedroom, this conversation transcended everything up to that point. It was like all of the sudden we stopped being children and put on our adult masks. And it didn't strike me hard until we eventually started talking about very "adult" things: about how best to handle our crazy mother and about him becoming a father, and about true love, romance and bliss. It was then that I realized perhaps for the very first time that we weren't playing pretend. We actually are adults. We are...adults?
Somewhere between West Palm Beach and New York City and Venice Italy we both grew up and became adults. And not that I didn't think it would happen, I just didn't expect it to happen this way. Yet underneath all the confusion and situations that adulthood bestows, I know that if he had the chance, he would headlock me and hold me there until I begrudgingly scream out ...mercy!
Thursday, July 17, 2008
In a Valley
Today is a much better day than any day this week has been and I'm attributing it to the full nine hours of sleep I got last night--the first full nine hours since probably long before Memorial Day weekend. My body fought that nine hours though, waking me up after the four or five its gotten accustomed to this summer. It's been a busy summer, with traveling every weekend and tons of fun and until Sunday it had been a quiet summer on the emotional drama front.
But when it rains it pours, and this week has been no exception. I cannot morally go into all of the things that are storming down right now; storms that are ravishing not only my own life, but the lives of the people I love around me. But let it be said that these are some serious issues, and that if you are a believer of any kind, even if it's not necessarily in a God...that now would be a perfect time to offer up some prayers for my family and for my friends. Let it also be said that I would not ask unless it was absolutely necessary. Without the valleys, the view from the hills would be a lot less beautiful, at least that is what I'm going to continue to tell myself until this all blows over.
But when it rains it pours, and this week has been no exception. I cannot morally go into all of the things that are storming down right now; storms that are ravishing not only my own life, but the lives of the people I love around me. But let it be said that these are some serious issues, and that if you are a believer of any kind, even if it's not necessarily in a God...that now would be a perfect time to offer up some prayers for my family and for my friends. Let it also be said that I would not ask unless it was absolutely necessary. Without the valleys, the view from the hills would be a lot less beautiful, at least that is what I'm going to continue to tell myself until this all blows over.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Steel
The rain came down hard on the skylights at about half-past five this morning, and even in my delirious state I cursed mother nature for delivering such poorly disguised irony. The weather always has a direct affect on my mood, a way of predetermining the way my day will pan out, the way I can or sometimes cannot face the world head-on and strong. Once I woke up and walked my dog, this morning proved to be no different. The rain was as cold as steel and the air carried a chill that spoke as if to echo my heart.
When I got to work, my office neighbor could immediately tell that something was wrong; he came in and closed my door quietly asking if everything was all right or if I needed to talk. It's no secret that I wear my heart on my sleeve. I do not hide anything well. I never have. I probably never will.
The truth is I am okay. I am better than okay. I am perfectly happy and content with where I am in my life, and where I think I am going. But last night, as I sat on a steel bench at the Newark airport train station, a bench I know that I've sat on before many many years ago, head in hands tears in eyes wishing for one more minute, one more hour, one more day--I didn't feel okay. At that point, I wasn't sure how much time would have to pass until everything felt okay again. It was right then that I realized while it's understandable to feel the way that I do and it's acceptable to cry and to hurt, the only way to get through this, the only way to grow, to learn and to love is to become as strong as the steel bench upon which I sat. And so I took off my sunglasses, I wiped away my tears, I put on the iPod and a smile and did a little tap dance on the cement floor before I boarded a train to head home...
When I got to work, my office neighbor could immediately tell that something was wrong; he came in and closed my door quietly asking if everything was all right or if I needed to talk. It's no secret that I wear my heart on my sleeve. I do not hide anything well. I never have. I probably never will.
The truth is I am okay. I am better than okay. I am perfectly happy and content with where I am in my life, and where I think I am going. But last night, as I sat on a steel bench at the Newark airport train station, a bench I know that I've sat on before many many years ago, head in hands tears in eyes wishing for one more minute, one more hour, one more day--I didn't feel okay. At that point, I wasn't sure how much time would have to pass until everything felt okay again. It was right then that I realized while it's understandable to feel the way that I do and it's acceptable to cry and to hurt, the only way to get through this, the only way to grow, to learn and to love is to become as strong as the steel bench upon which I sat. And so I took off my sunglasses, I wiped away my tears, I put on the iPod and a smile and did a little tap dance on the cement floor before I boarded a train to head home...
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Her Brain was Still on Vacation
Mondays are tough, even tougher when you've just had four days off, even tougher still when you're stuck in the coffee pantry with the one coworker you don't get along with but are forced to make conversation with regardless.
Coworker [begrudgingly]: Did you have a nice weekend; where did you go again?
Me: Went out to Long Island with the girls; Montauk.
Coworker: Oh, is there a beach there?
Me [trying hard not to sound dumbfounded]: It's....an island so...yes.
Coworker: Oh I thought it was connected to land somewhere.
Me: Nope; I think that's kind of what they mean by "island."
Coworker: Oh, I could have sworn Long Island wasn't really an island; I've never been there except to go to the beach.
Coworker [begrudgingly]: Did you have a nice weekend; where did you go again?
Me: Went out to Long Island with the girls; Montauk.
Coworker: Oh, is there a beach there?
Me [trying hard not to sound dumbfounded]: It's....an island so...yes.
Coworker: Oh I thought it was connected to land somewhere.
Me: Nope; I think that's kind of what they mean by "island."
Coworker: Oh, I could have sworn Long Island wasn't really an island; I've never been there except to go to the beach.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Sticky Sweet
It has mostly been packing and re-packing, with a little unpacking in between; the bag from the weekend before still sitting half-full of memories and the dresses I was too lazy to hang away in the rightful spot. It has also been mostly sleepless nights, half-awake commutes, triple cup double shot mornings, late afternoon diet cokes and green teas, sneaking in a nap after the gym sometimes in lieu of the gym. It has been new and exciting and intriguing and inviting; there has been so much laughter it's almost as if I have my own laugh track, like the sitcoms. It has been lost in the rapture, lost in the moment, found in the moment and then lost again. It has been mostly wonderful, humid, sticky, hot and sometimes sweet, thunderstorms late at night, rain when the stars have fallen and my eyes are heavy, when it no longer matter if I forgot my umbrella or am wearing flip flops. It has been a blur of fun, a blur of memories I will never forget, a blur of sunshine and blue skies, of puffy clouds and fresh air; it has definitely been one hell of a summer so far...a summer that is only half over!
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