These days
The stories are coming faster and more furiously these days. “What If We Stopped Pretending the Climate Apocalypse Can Be Stopped?” reads a most recent headline. Of course I want to turn away. I don’t want to dive in, to really consider the words in front of me. But I read on. I read as much as I can. I try to let the meaning sink below my defenses, try to open my mind and heart and whatever wisdom I can muster to what this all might mean for yourself and your sister and the wild future towards which you head.
I read. I consider. And then, when your cries tell me you have woken from your nap, I put aside the articles and climb the stairs, bare feet on hard wood. I open curtains and peer over the edge of your crib. We have a routine, you and I. I let in the light and you greet me with the widest of toothless grins. The world is bright and opening for you.
I pick you up and we settle in to nurse. I open Mary Oliver’s collection of poetry and let the words wash over me like a waterfall. They don’t eliminate the emotions that echo after all I just read. Instead, they thread between that reality and deepen its meaning. I ache and love and hope not only for you and your sister, but also for the wild geese, the grasshopper, the summer day.
I cannot turn away from the truth. Do I wish it otherwise? I don’t know. It’s not a question I spend much time considering. My days, these days, encompass a wild juxtaposition. I hold you and your sister, I love you, I watch as you meet the world, ready for each new discovery. Together, we are enchanted. And then I tuck you both in to nap or place you in the arms and care of another and I read the articles. I write grants for local, solutions-focused action on climate change. I research, consider and write about how one might best parent in these times. How to give you the tools you might need? The question reverberates. I connect with others who are seeking action, solutions, trying to gift a livable world. It’s imperfect. But I try.
And then I return to you and your sister, to your soft new bodies and deep, soulful hearts. We gather together in the woods with your father and our beloved pup. We eat a picnic lunch, pausing to examine mosses, hold pinecones, and watch the light shift between the trees. We sit in a rare moment of silence. Enchantment.
It’s all true. Just as death and life, love and grief are inextricably linked, I cannot fathom how I could love you and your sister as I do and not let in the truth of your world. Heartbreaking, yes, it is. And thank goodness. May my heart break open wide every single day that I’m fortunate enough to spend with you. May it break with the enormous challenge of your future and with the way your dimpled hands slowly consider each new rock. I cannot imagine another way to spend each day.