I’ve never met you… but I love you

 

Today, I found out I had another older brother. He died before I was born, before he could argue with me, before he could tell me to “get out” or “don’t look under there.” Before he could teach me to drive stick, or throw a ball, or hold my hand when our other brother was hit by a motorcycle.

In the month I turn 31, I’m thinking about my brother who would be 45. I’m wondering if one grows in heaven. If older brother is 45 or if he is still 8 months old?

Is he waiting for his umbilical cord to fall off? Someone to brush out his cradle cap?  Or was he hovering over me cackling at naïve decisions regarding boyfriends, clothing choice, and a strange addition to Marvin the Martian?

Was he there, when my children were being born? Waiting to catch them in case they fell into the arms of the other universe instead of the doctor?

What’s my other brother’s name?

I have many friends who have suffered from losing their children. I have seen names drawn in sand, balloons raised in honor. I have seen holes the shape of tiny feet in the hearts of many mothers.

Loss.

I only knew that my mother had experienced loss. I never truly listened to the story. I never heard my other older brother.

My mother is one of those women you meet and strength exudes from her. When angry, her green eyes bulge just slightly out of her sockets but mostly, the grassy hue softens in kindness. She is selfless in the way she provides for her grandchildren.

You’d never imagine my mother experienced her first child fall out of her, still. You’d never imagine she fainted, was wrapped in a blanket, and was driven to the ambulance in a police car. You’d never imagine the financial strife or the husbands, the terrible husbands.

She calls her grandchildren and showers them in love and Minnie Mouse paraphernalia. She stands as a woman with fear behind her and love in front of her.

My other older brother would be proud- no matter his age.

I sit thinking about the family we would have been, when my first brother has been part of us all along. He created my mother’s strength. She leads her life with his tiny foot prints stamped into her heart. She loves us with a love that began with him.

So, he was there holding my hand. He was laughing with me as I backed into a tree. He was with my older brother during every accident. The family we are, no matter how jumbled or rollercoaster ride it may feel, is ours. May we always learn and acknowledge every step that got us here, every obstacle our parents tackled restlessly- and exude gratitude.  

About Nothing and Everything (A Letter)

Sitting at my old writing spot in the local coffee shop, I had the need to talk to a blank page... to talk to you. I haven't written in a year and while I can list the moments of elation and depletion that have filled those days, I will not. Well, I will but not on purpose.

This time, last year, Rylee was 9 months. She was standing on her own. She was learning how to use her limbs. We were house hunting and picking up coins from dirtied floors. These coins would later pay for a fresh coat of paint on our constantly in renovation home.

I won't promise that I'll write more frequently. Chances are, you will forget me to the light that fills you...but on occasion..when the light is right, the quiet around me is actual quiet, I will talk to you. I will tell you how the beauty of silence is just as the beauty you always searched for. The one that was half reflective and half liquid.

What I wish for you is that no matter how little I write you, Father, that you hear me. That you take a moment to notice how Rylee's cheeks are yours. Even though she will never know you, she will be taking on the planet with some of your influence.

Will you still watch, when the newest girl arrives? She will also need the beam of your lighthouse. That ever revolving light that fills a Werner with a broken compass. The directions of others, does not have to be the direction of thyself. Right?

When I hand my daughters your letters, I hope they are inspired to write.

Will you teach them that written words are potent? The pages stained with the scent of the hand that glided across on a whim of self revelation, of love, of the need to talk.

The worst time in my life was when I realized I would no longer receive postcards from you. The mailbox was exactly how my mother saw it- a reminder of all the responsibilities you can't take control of. The flying whale no longer swam on your page and into the dusty basement apartment.

These are the things I will remember. No matter how dry the oceans get, time does not nourish grief into a tolerable being. Time just cloaks her into a saddened seed. One that will grow when you are in just the right place. One that will thorn its way into your space.

That's when I call for lighthouses.

Someday, I will get that tattoo. Someday, I will tell my daughters how you sailed the oceans before Fedex, UPS, and Google took over the world. I will tell them how you took to a guitar like the ocean took to you. How your voice was just the right amount of raspy. How waves were bigger than boats, and hearts were not symbols of love but symbols of friendship.

You may not have always been a father, but you were always a friend.

And I am grateful for that.

That's about all I can find in my quiet today.

Let the light emerge,
A

Take a seat Ms. Editor, the Inspiration bus has pulled in.

I've been on an editing role. Editing blogs, editing poems, editing other people's work, editing our belongings, editing my wardrobe, editing baby food menus.

Today as I sat down to write, I realized my first inclination was to pick up something I had already written. This seemed off.  I paused and wrote an email to Rylee's daycare to announce her full-time enrollment. Up until now she has been a part-time joy to the 5 other infants in her "class." This is not to say she is crying half the time but only physically there half the time. You understood that though, right? Sorry.

As I began my letter, a mother and her toddler daughter sat in the table ahead of me. The mother patiently described the food they were eating. The little girl picked up her grilled cheese, chewed a bite or two and said, "Thank you Mommy" with a huge cheesy grin. My heart is still full and sunken from this act. Rylee and I have a new game. I pretend to sit on her lap while she is in her highchair. Then, I jump up in surprise "I DIDN'T REALIZE THERE WAS A BABY SITTING HERE?" She cracks up uncontrollably. "Do you know what it is like when someone thinks you are funny ALL the time. No matter what you do, they laugh?" I said this to a friend of mine when he witnessed my dear daughter giggling her toes off at my "moon walk." 

Edit. Edit. Edit. The one thing I never have to edit is that smile. The laughter. Even the sleepless teething nights. Perfection that girl of mine is. She is an inspiration to what naturally exists without needing a semicolon or clarification. Her speedy crawl when I open the daycare door is as poetic as anything can get. 

Tucking the editor away in my shoulder bag, I pulled out my pencil and wrote freshly in the cafe air. 

Not the New Year Post.

It's 3:50AM. I've already:

•  Changed a diaper.
• Cleaned a poopy accident from one of our dogs (whhhhaaat the hell!). 
• Fed a gorgeous baby.
• Got gently tapped on the head and spatted at, "Jezee...NO." I usually enjoy my husband's sleep talking but this particular act wasn't as funny as, "Oh. This is my beautiful daughter." Okay. Maybe that's not as funny as it is cute. 
• Rocked my sick daughter to sleep. 
• Changed out of a snotty shirt to a warm hoody.
• Stared at the ceiling. 
• Read an article on baby food. 
• Gave up and landed here. 

The last week has been filled with events like this. I've had dreams of writing about the New Year and how I think resolutions are bologna. Shouldn't we be resoluting (yes, made up word) every day? I wanted to write a post that was snarky but thoughtful. Something truthful for us to mull around in our heartbrains.

Just over a year ago, I was up this late writing poetry or just getting home from bartending. Brooklyn was shining around me as I walked/trained/taxied my way home. The East River broke it's waves rhythmically as I typed poems in the early morning.

Today...This Morning...I'm in a studio apartment with 4 big souls. A toy turtle glows the western hemisphere sky onto the ceiling and a plush lamb is sputtering out ocean waves. We are too low to see the sky and it is too dark to see the grass. Being up with this fight, the fight to make a better place for ourselves isn't as glamorous as the sound of Brooklyn metal gates closing late at night but it sure is beautiful. I can feel the mark we are making. The hope that this will create for Rylee.

I sat on the floor today with tears abrim (yes, another made up word) my sleepless hazels. Doug looked at me with his big browns. He listened and that big heart of his stared into mine.  Rylee put a purple triangle into a purple triangle slot. The dogs inched their way onto the carpet. We were five on a 5 x 7 area rug. We hugged. We're not counting pennies anymore. We are planting our feet in our careers. We are house hunting, baby nurturing, dog loving and fighting a beautiful fight. 

Over dinner yesterday, four of us discussed appreciation. During the conversation, I remembered what my mom went through to provide us with skating, dancing, and art lessons. I remember sitting at the table with a permission slip for a class trip. In bold print, "please bring $10.00 along with this form." Mom didn't say no. She opened a splintered cabinet of our basement apartment and pulled out a Folgers coffee can. The smell of coffee puffed into the air as she opened the lid and handed me a $10.00 bill.

When we wanted to go to the movies, Mom didn't say no. She picked a matinee, popped kernels on the stove and filled sippy cups with juice. It wasn't embarrassing. We weren't ashamed. She made opening the ziplock bag just as fun as digging your hand into a big bowl of that fancy movie theater corn. Truth is, I still prefer the stove cooked stuff over the commercial. Maybe it's a little bit of that appreciation seeping through.

Maybe I'm not writing with a view of a smoky river, or in a luxurious nightgown, or with a glass of deep red. I do, however, have a view of the big dipper from a turtle's back, waves resounding from a little lamb, a peaceful snore from the most precious girl to have ever existed, a husband resting to work overtime in just an hour, and a warm blanket draped over my knees. Life is pretty damn good.

Appreciate all of it.
A

Greenville

On most days, if you ask me what my favorite colors is, I'll say green. Sometimes, I say yellow. Sometimes, red or black. Green, in all of its shades, has a sweeping sense of being grounded. It stands high in trees and low in the yards of families with or without picket fences. It feels the souls of runners in long paths of parks. It is nature. It is war. It is reptile. It is Christmas.

It may seem like a trivial topic but colors help define the way we relate to the world. We all have our own definitions for everything. Our unique experiences create our likes and dislikes. Maybe you love the rusty reds because it reminds you of your childhood home. Maybe you love navy because it represents a well worn sweater from your grandfather.

What does Green mean to me?

* It's a food:  Rylee is officially, a professional eater. We have successfully tried sweet potato, banana, oatmeal and rice. A few days ago, I mushed up some Avocado confident she would enjoy it as much as I do. Please glance at the picture. You can see that her reaction was not of satisfaction; her tongue shot back out, her eyes closed and a frown emerged. If she could have, she would have said, "WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?" We tried avocado three days in a row and got the same exact reaction each time.

Today, I propped Rylee up in her feeding chair and steamed fresh peas. The green brightened in the pot and when I pureed them, the substance reminded me of a substance from Rufio's food fight in Peter Pan. I stood in front of her with a grin that was intended to hide my fear. "Please like this," I whispered between my wide flat grin. One spoonful and she stopped, swallowed and giggled. "HURRAY!" I flew my arms in the air, danced around the kitchen and prepared the next spoonful.

Green is nourishment. 

* It is a frog: Where would life be without kermit? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpiIWMWWVco

Green is important like a mountain. 

* It's hearing a too intimate conversation: "My dad told your dad, that you were a pistol. Not only is that true but you are beautiful too." That is extremly cute and hey, who wouldn't want to be called a pistol? As a outsider, however, I cringe and turn green and get a little bit ... Okay. Okay. OKAY. we get it. She is ammmmazing.

* Sunday Night Football: Let's be honest, until I met Doug I barely knew what "fumble" meant. There wasn't a color in the world that related to football. I barely knew it existed. When we were first living together, Doug pulled out two jerseys on a Sunday night and smiled "J.E.T.S." I raised my eyebrows, made some guacamole, put on the XXL Jersey as a dress, pulled a book from the shelf (just in case I got really bored) and listened to the man of my dreams decode a foreign language. 

Colors evolve.

* A Crap Hole: We are officially house hunting. This is a huge and intimidating and freaky step. As a writer and an electrician with an infant, saving for that "perfect" home has been a wonderful but grueling process. We drove around looking at vacant homes, their neighbors and the town. Rylee was sleeping. We took turns jumping out of the car, walking around the house and popping back in the car. It sorta went like this:

1. Shut Car Door. 

2. Peer In House.

3. Walk Back.

4. Try To Talk With Eyes. 

5. Shut Car Door. 

6. "Nope."

7. "You look."

8. Repeat steps 1-6. 

Then we saw this little green house. The mailbox stuffed with garbage, the stones on the pathway lifting up, an air conditioner built into the wall...

We repeated steps 1-5 but instead of "nope" we both said "maybe." While this might not be the home we end up buying, it was the first house that we both could imagine turning into our home.

Pale green = Hope.  

*** 

Find the color of your day, 

A

P.S. To quote Kermie... Stand out like "flashy sparkles in the water." 

The Tiny Christmas Town

The second you carve a Turkey, an Elf begins laying out his reds and greens. His wife begins pressing the pointy hat, so it points straight up signifying North: his residence and place of work. The world prepares in all of its trimmings for a month of purchasing.

Part of me has always rejected America's Big Industry preying on the individual's sense of sparkled tradition— old and new. As a result, you'll know you have received a gift from me; it will be wrapped in construction paper or the Family Circus or an article about the new exhibit in the MOMA or People's magazine. Yet, on a Christmas where my daughter will be 6-months, I can't help but wander the stores picking up little elf ornaments and figurines to decorate the house.

Despite my turbulent childhood, my mother put up a tree. She sat us down with a box of Kix to string for garland while she sprayed fake snow along the edges of our basement apartment windows. She bought popsicle sticks for us to transform into snowflake ornaments. A big stuffed Santa sat on a dusty arm chair in the living room while we ran around the cramped quarters.

As my step-father mounted himself on the couch with his traditional line of Budweiser cans, Mom lined up tiny porcelain houses with tiny porcelain families on top of our small entertainment center. Before the S-Dad came home from work, I'd set up in front of that little town. Two friends played in a mound of fake snow. A light lit up a Ma and Pop Grocer. I imagined the Father inside the open windowed home to be fixing hot cocoa. Maybe, I thought, he was helping with homework. Maybe he was just hugging his children. Maybe he was just...there. This world, which only surfaced during holiday cheer represented the wholesome world many of us crave.

I probably don't have to explain how it's media and the marketer's job to exploit nostalgia and the need for a glistening tradition. This is —I'm sure— something we are all aware of. Yet, it may not matter.

Tradition isn't a made up theory contrived from the MAN (Marketers And Networks). It exists because the tie to family is real. I want my daughter to associate the smell of pine to stringing cereal decorations or wearing big fuzzy mittens.

We deserve it.

This little month in the collection of twelve, helps define the meaning of family in a life. This is not to say it has to mimic the traditions of the porcelain family atop my childhood entertainment center. Hell, I hope this Christmas creates a tradition of eating dessert for lunch or making snow cones from the front lawn.

As long as Rylee sees the investment of Christmas not as a collection of toys but of quirks that make her holiday season unique to this family... as well as universal, to share the joy with others.

With a big ribbon,
A

A Leaf

When Rylee was a few weeks old, she would stare out of the car window with a big gummy grin. It took me a few weeks to figure out how drawn she is to trees. Whenever I take the dogs out, she lifts her head high, examining the shapes and colors.

Her non-blood but equally important Grandmother gave us large flash cards. One set was a large collection of leaves. I set them up on Rylee's changing table. She pulls them toward her trying to eat a Maple Sycamore.

This past weekend, a wedding in Vermont prompted a vacation for Doug, Rylee and I. After we stuffed the car with every single contraption a baby needs (and doesn't need), I pulled off Rylee's sunshade so she could enjoy the burnt oranges and rusty reds of changing leaves.

***

As a skinny twig of a 13 year-old, I was content with spending my summer with my three best friends. Christina and I would loaf around her parents pool, go to the movies and swoon over Leonardo (Ugh. I know.). Michele and I would sit in her room listening to music. Anthony and I would run up and down the block with our bikes. Each of us shared an innocence that I am grateful for.

One afternoon Anthony and I walked to the top of our street. There was a loud sound blaring from the corner house. "What's that?" I shrugged my shoulders and when we moved closer I could hear that it was Metallica. The boy who lived in that house ended up joining the cluster of us spending the summer on the block; he was my first crush.

The first crush teaches you a few things:

1. Start brushing your hair.
2. Imagine yourself as the singer of that desperately cheesy love song.
3. There is going to be someone other than your family/friends in your life.

Like many youthful crushes, ours lasted less than the summer. When the fall came, we remained friends. Then, he moved from the block and eventually, I did too.

***

About three weeks into my relationship with Doug, I was in Ohio helping a friend run for Congress. Doug called me from a concert with friends. He was talking to them about his new relationship and when showing a picture of me, his friend said, "that's Stacy."

Let's take a little break from this musing to explain. Stacy is my childhood name. My mother despised the nickname Ana and asked people to call me Stacy instead. This stuck until I got to college and started going by my legal name. So, the only way you'll hear Stacy is if you are listening to a group of my childhood friends chat or if my mother and brother are occupying a room.

And we're back on track...

Doug said, "Ummm. Yea. That's what her Mom calls her."

It just so happened that my first crush moved into the town Doug grew up in. At that new school, he started dating Doug's best friend. The universe doing universey things without any of us knowing.

***

When we got their wedding invitation in the mail, I pinned it to the cork board with a huge grin on my face. Rich and Bridget have been together since High School. Bridget was Rylee's first babysitter. When Rylee was born, Bridget rushed to the hospital, plopped in the seat by my hospital bed ready to hold her "niece."

Driving in the car with a sunset hue masked over the trees, I breathed in all the change. Rylee cooed and giggled to the sweeping colors.

We arrived in time to unpack, get dressed and drive to the church. The wedding was filled with love. Bridget and Rich danced with adoration in their eyes. I cried at the best man/maid of honor/father of the groom speeches. Someone did a split on the dance floor. Rylee got lots of pictures with the Bride. Watching them with champagne glasses in hand, standing close to one another, I was saturated in nostalgia. We were experiencing life as a colorful transformation.

When the boys went out for cigars, a James Taylor song came on. Every couple got up and danced. Rylee snuggled in my arms and closed her eyes. I witnessed how much people can love, how much they can change, and I squeezed my daughter even closer.

***

The next morning, the wind made a presence. It twisted in the trees and leaves scattered everywhere. We have grown into better versions of our young selves. We let change take us with a gust. We flew to high heights, drifted to lows and back up again.

Today, I am but a simple leaf.
A