Violet practiced her new speedy skip, racing ahead of her brother, Max. She kept a safe distance between them in case she needed to reach him in a hurry but stayed just far enough ahead to make his little legs hustle with worry to keep up with her. She liked making him worry a little. He needed to be ready for the dangers in this life and he was just too silly all the time, trying to be funny and cute and make people laugh. She liked knowing that she wouldn't let anything happen to him, but he had a lot to learn. Until then, she would keep him safe. Violet was ready for anything.

One night Violet dreamt that her mother took them on a long journey to the country of Mexico. It was crowded and bustling in the streets and hard for Violet to hold on to her mother with one hand and Max with the other. She looked back to make sure she could remember where they had parked their blue bug but the streets were so crowded. Looking around, she tried to memorize this spot but the signs were all in Spanish, nothing stood out to her, everything was jumbled and the same. Her mother pulled them along and Violet struggled to keep a firm hold of Max's hand. She called out "Slow down, Mom" but her mother didn't seem to hear her. She turned to her little brother and said "Do NOT let go of my hand, Max. This is important, Max, OK?" Max nodded, wide-eyed and serious. Turning back around Violet stumbled on a curb. When she stood up she saw her mother moving away in the crowd. "Mom! Mother! Waaaait!" she cried. She could feel tears gathering at the back of her real life throat. She may have called out in her sleep. She pulled Max close to her side and looked around. People were in a hurry everywhere. No one noticed that Violet and Max were having A Crisis. They started to make their way back toward the blue Volkswagen. "Mommy's gonna meet us at the car, Max. OK, Max?" Violet was brave and a very good sister. She wondered if she could drive the car back to their house if her mom never showed up. She felt weird for thinking that. Of course mom would show up! She would realize that they weren't right behind her and come racing back. She would be so worried and so relieved when she saw them sitting safely in the blue bug with the red leather seats. She would say "Violet, sweetie, you are so smart! I just knew you would find the car and wait for me!"

But, that's not how the dream ended. Violet didn't like to think about it but that dream bothered her a lot. She woke up sobbing at the end. Her mother, packed into the back of a pickup truck full of people, her face strangely illuminated in the crowd. Violet screamed for her mom but she stared back, blankly, as the truck slowly rumbled away in a cloud of dust.

Well Violet was not going to let anything like that happen. She slowed her aggressive skipping to a light gallop and let Max catch up with her. "Hey, Max - wanna go look for stingrays?" They were playing on the bay today while their mom was at work. She had a job at the bank now and most afternoons Violet and Max were very good at keeping themselves busy until their mom got home. Today Violet decided they were going to go all the way around the bay, the farthest they'd ever been. That should keep them busy! There was a lot to explore and probably many dangers to avoid along the way. Violet cut away from the path and ran down toward the water. She kicked her feet in the soft sand and called out to her brother "Keep a look out for floating brown paper bags. That's what a stingray looks like when it sails near the surface."

"Violet, I'm hungry." Max whined. He plopped down in the sand and started throwing shells at the gathering seagulls. Violet sighed "We have a long way to go. A long, long way before we get to the end. Mom won't be home until 5:25. We just have to keep ourselves occupied and entertained until she gets home. Don't you have any leftovers from lunch?" Violet's stomach rumbled as she dug around in Max's backpack.
"Here's some carrot sticks. Eat these. They're good for you, Max."

Violet practiced a few cartwheels, careful to keep her legs as straight as possible. Then she tried some running round offs but the soft sand made it hard to push off with her hands. She landed with a thud, her legs buckling beneath her. Violet rolled over onto her stomach and stretched out her legs toward the path. She rested her chin on her hands and stared out at the calm, blue bay. She could see Max out of the corner of her eye driving his carrot sticks around in the sand. She wondered when their Dad was coming to visit them. She wanted him to hear how good she was doing in Spanish. Violet had begged her mom to let her take the after school Spanish class at their new school. It was free so their mom said Max could go, too. The class was on Tuesdays and Thursdays for half an hour. Max never practiced at home but Violet felt it was important for them to know Spanish, just in case. Violet worked very hard on perfecting her accent. She wanted to make sure she was clearly understood. La blusa roja es muy bonita. She trilled her 'r's. Muchas gracias! Muchas gracias!

Violet and Max started Crown Point Elementary in the middle of the school year. Violet was in the third grade, Mrs. Cook's class, and Max was in Kindergarten with the babies. She missed her friends at her old school in the desert and she missed her Dad but she loved living near the water. She loved the waves and the birds and the yogurt shop they sometimes walked to after dinner. She got hers with carob chips, something she'd never heard of until they moved to the beach. Some people don't eat chocolate. She couldn't remember if it's because it had meat in it or too many chemicals. She just knew that carob meant healthy and they were all trying to have a healthy and positive lifestyle. She thought that had something to do with not living with her Dad anymore.

"Max! Leave those birds alone!"
Violet jumped up and brushed the sand off her jeans. "Let's race to the tennis courts!"
"No, Violet!" he whined again. "I'm too tired!"
"Well, what do you want to do? We have a long way to go to get to the end." She sat down on her knees beside him.
"I don't want to go to the end, Violet. I want to go home." Max threw his carrot sticks at the nearby gulls. They scattered briefly and then flew to inspect the sticks, gobbling them down and then spitting them back up again.
"We can't go home yet. Mom isn't there and we are sitting ducks if we wait on the porch. Someone might try to grab us. We have to look like we are doing something or going somewhere on purpose."
"Do this, Max. Look behind you and pretend like you're waving at someone who's watching us from one of the houses on the boardwalk."
Violet rose up on her elbow and turned toward the row of houses. She smiled and waved and then gave a thumbs up sign.
"Violet, that's so stupid." Max said as he gave a little half wave in the same direction.
Violet stared at the big, beautiful houses lined up along the walk. She thought again about the families inside, sitting together, maybe having an afternoon snack. The kids sat at the table with their mom and talked about what they would do when Dad got home from work. Maybe they would play Wiffle Ball on the sand before dinner. Or maybe afterward they would all walk across the street to the ocean and watch the sunset together.
"When is Dad coming to see us?" Max said. Sometimes it seemed he could see her thoughts, like they were cartoon bubbles floating over her head.

A sudden wind rustled some palm trees lining the bay walk path. Violet stared at the waving fronds, listened to the creak and moan of the long, lean trunk bending in the breeze and thought about her home in the desert. She wondered when her Mom would be done with this adventure. Would they go back home or would Dad move here? Would they stay in their little yellow beach bungalow or would they move into a bigger, family type house right on the bay? Either way she knew her mom would stop going on dates with that creepy, weirdo from the bank, the Shiny Hair Man. No more sweet and guilty lollipops from him! No more trips to The Boardwalk for dizzy, delirious, expensive rides on the ancient, wooden roller coaster. He wasn't so bad, she thought, even though his teeth were so, so white. But every time he pulled up in his funny, little convertible, all she could think of was that lonely palm tree in their desert front yard, tall and still and so far away.

"Max" she said, snapping to, "get your stuff together. We're going Home."

The last time I felt this bad about the weather we were sitting by that tired, old green sedan waiting for your tired, old grumpy uncle to get off work and remember us. We needed a ride. I looked at you through the haze of that hot and ugly day and thought "Do I really love you? Can it be that you're the one I have to wait with - forever?"
You were aimless, as usual, but I was determined to make our appointment. You kicked at the tire with the back of your heel. You bored the shit out of me, rattling on about all your grievances. All those idiots, all those jerks. I just hated you.
I tried to remember way back to that time when I practically worshiped everything about you. Back to that feeling of you being too good for me. I felt so far away from that time.
We waited. We waited for your uncle and you spit in the dirt and I tried to recreate something like love in my mind, on my lips, at the back of my throat. In my thighs.
You said you wished it would rain, that that would serve us right. Being stuck here, without a car, waiting on some old grump who could care less about us needin' to be somewhere. I imagined you soaking wet and miserable. Wanted to punish you with that thought.
But then I remembered another wet and hot afternoon. Wet, hot, super sexy. We were just teenagers then, hormonal and grandiose. You were so beautiful. You climbed out of the lake, your body young, firm, perfect. God, we were young. You were soaking wet, smiling and coming straight towards me. You wanted me, then, this lucky girl.
I thought about that day and remembered but good. Wallowed in it. I recalled a different kind of heat and tried to hold on to it for future use.
We missed our appointment that day. Your uncle never did show, just wandered off to the bar when his shift was over. We walked home without hurry. Dragged ourselves along in the dusty heat of another lost day. I kept pressing on my little belly. It was weird but I wondered if I could get used to the idea.
You skipped rocks off the asphalt, like skipping stones on a lake. I couldn't imagine you as a grown man, even though you were almost 25 then. I couldn't imagine you in charge of anything so important.

Signs

I hope I'm getting closer to the answer. I've had days of signs and more pieces to add to this ever-expanding puzzle. I know I might be conjuring something out of thin air but I do sort of believe this story I'm telling myself. I just hope it starts to make sense soon.

The first sign I noticed was a couple of weeks ago when I heard my driver, Mark, whistling a tune in the cooler. It was making me bananas, trying to figure out what song it was - a tune I hadn't heard in years but knew that I knew. He is an unconscious whistler so it took him a minute to even start it up again when I asked him about it. When he did he said it was a song his grandpa used to sing and that he had no idea what it even was. Jen and I made him whistle it again and again until, finally, she picked up on it. "Everything is B'youuuuuu - t'fullllll in it's own wayyyyyyy" We sang together like we do sometimes when we're getting goofy. I knew the song from the hippie church services my mom used to drag us to at the double screen Palms-to-Pines movie theater in Palm Desert. It felt good to sing that song and think about that time. Those memories are old and largely untroubled. I remembered that we also sang "Let There Be Peace On Earth" with the whole congregation holding hands and swaying, like the Whos at the end of The Grinch. I love that song. When I went through a spiritual re-purposing at 12 I would change the lyrics to either "with God as our mother....." or "with dog as our father...." Yeah, I thought I was hilarious.

The next day - the very next day - Devin and I drove out to Buckman Springs for a hike and, while listening to Car Talk, I suddenly hear Ray (or was it Tom? The one I picture heavier and less serious). Anyway, Ray or Tom starts singing "Everything is Beautiful" in response to a caller. !!??!  ?@$%&*?!  (That's not swearing. That's befuddlement with a Really?! on the end. I'm currently obsessed with people saying "Really?!"  with an incredulous, sarcastic head tilt. Nelwyn does it perfectly.) It wasn't commented on. It wasn't elaborated upon. It wasn't even related to the call. It just happened. It was just sung for a minute in the background and it felt as though it happened for me alone. I hadn't thought of that song in years and years. Why was it suddenly coming up two days in a row in unrelated contexts? Was there like a Wendy's commercial that I didn't know about using that song? I thought there must be some current cultural reference out there. That made sense to me at the time but I decided that if I wanted to use it as some kind of sign that was fine. The lyrics are positive and I could stand some of that right now. I left the song in my head but let the coincidence go.

That was Sunday.

On Monday I had a long delayed appointment at the orthodontist that I had been simultaneously needing, dreading and avoiding. Mason and I had braces at the same time so we had all of our appointments together. The staff knew us equally well and they just loved Mason. They knew him all through high school - Super Star Mason - and were so excited when he got accepted to Santa Cruz. About a year after his breakdown, during my aggressive, confrontational, confessional, gut-spilly stage, I got a call from the receptionist hoping to schedule a retainer-check appointment for him. I said something really sensitive like "He just got out of the mental hospital and he's kind of psychotic right now so No, I don't think he'll be able to get his retainer checked." Even with that inappropriate reply I was still surprised that she didn't press me for details. See how I mean aggressive? I spent the next year and a half fuming, when I thought about it, that no one from the office called to see how we were doing. I took it personally and I was hurt and defensive in my thinking the worst about why they never contacted me. By the time I finally decided to get over it and go in for my appointment I was in what I thought was a very zen state about the whole thing. I prepared the various facial expressions I thought I might need - serious, receptive to sympathy, internally destroyed but externally accepting of a situation beyond my control (I'm a pro at that one). Above all I wanted to 1) look like someone who has tried everything within her power to effect a positive outcome (guiltless) and 2) act like someone who hadn't given a second thought to the fact that no one from this office reached out to us in our 2 and 1/2 years of hell. I might have been over thinking this.

After signing in to zero fanfare I sat in the waiting area and practiced my yogic breathing. I was peaceful. I was calm. I began to wonder if I blew this whole thing out of proportion. They weren't ignoring us. They were just giving us space. They weren't uncaring. They just didn't know what to say. I could understand that. I started to relax and chided myself for being such a spazz. I thought that once I got in to see the doctor she would make some small allusion to IT and then we would just move on. Phew. No big deal.


A few minutes later I was called and got settled into my chair. The doctor came straight in, sat right beside me and said "How is our sweet, wonderful boy? Didn't he go off to college?" I stared at her face, just inches from mine, and processed multiple lines of thought. I realized that, after all my obsessing, I was completely unprepared for this moment. It hadn't occurred to me that maybe they didn't call because they didn't know. It had been so long since anyone didn't know, so long since the time when I could pull up a quick little synopsis soundbite, that I was actually at a loss for words. I also felt myself wanting to hold on to this moment for as long as possible; to stay in this time and place with this person who adored Mason and also still saw him the way he once was. I fixed this idea in my mind and imagined myself saying "Yes. He did. He's doing great." I was frozen in thought, wanting to both stay in this parallel universe and also trying to think what to say when I realized that Adele's "Make You Feel My Love" was playing on the office radio. This beautiful, Bob Dylan cover was like an anthem for me during Mason's second big breakdown. I sent out a link with lyrics to my closest friends and wrote about how well this song expressed my deepest, deepest. This song is so intensely emotional for me that, as soon as I became aware that it was on in the background, I lost it. I absolutely couldn't speak. I tried. I was crying, stuttering. It was pitiful. I told her I was sorry. I tried to pull it together. I blurted out a few bullet points and apologized for getting so emotional. I blamed the song. (It was embarrassing but we got through it enough for her to try to sell me another $6,500 orthodontic package all in the space of like thirteen minutes from "sign in" to "sign on the dotted line." Pass. Jeez, I just wanted my retainer tightened up a little.) I left drained, deflated.

I couldn't stop thinking about that song popping up at that time. Why that song? Why then? A coincidence? I guess. It's popular and it is one of a small number of songs that could have played in that moment that would have had similar - not the same, though! - Mason/Sarah significance. Still. There aren't that many songs connected to The Horrible Thing That Happened. Of all the songs in the world that could have played just then ... It didn't feel coincidental at the time but I guess that's how it always is when we attach meaning to moments. We see what we want to see, right? While by now I had only noticed two 'signs' I connected them and wondered if there had been others that I had missed. This is when I really started paying attention. 


The following Sunday I went to my morning yoga class and my teacher put us into a cool pose I've never done or heard of before. All these years of doing yoga and not only had I not been in this pose in just this way but I had never heard anyone use this term in yoga, either. I can't remember the pose now but it was something like a half bow. She had us in some belly floor position and then we reached back and held one leg and she said "making a teardrop shape." I noticed it specifically because I hadn't done it or heard of it before. That same afternoon I had Nelwyn's son, Lucca, over to get all crafty with me. We collected wildflowers in the canyon and then made waxed-paper flower window art. After we ironed out our creations we were cutting off the edges and my husband said "You should cut them into cool shapes, like teardrops." ?! What the fuck?! Honestly, I don't think my husband has ever even said the word teardrop. What was going on??!!?!  I quietly freaked out so as not to freak out Lucca.

By now I really started thinking that a message was trying to reach me. What was it though? What was I supposed to get from this? I understand the concept of priming, that once we are conditioned to look for something we start seeing it everywhere, but what if there was something bigger happening? If priming or coincidence or cultural reference are all possible explanations can't something more metaphysical be an equal option as well? Even if it was all in my head, then what message was my own subconscious trying to send me? I did not want to mess this up.


The following Saturday we went to dinner with our good friends Steven and Nicole. We sat outside on Gingham's lovely little patio and ate and drank and talked like we do. We were having fun but, the Mason question has a place and a time and it comes, inevitably and always. It has to. I think we were talking about crazy crap we did as teenagers when Steven turned to me and asked "So, how is Mason doing?" I paused to think, "How do I want to answer? We're having such a nice time." I remember I looked down at my feet for some reason, gathering my thoughts. When I turned my head back I just had to laugh. It was ridiculous. I thought "This cannot, simply CAN NOT, be a coincidence. Something is trying to reach me." The song in the background, from a speaker somewhere behind Steve's right shoulder, was "Paper Planes" by M.I.A. This song has one and only one reference for me. I know where it's from. I think I know what it's supposed to be about. But to me it's connected to one thing and it stamps in place a time so far away it might as well have happened in a dream. Years ago when Mason was into speed cubing one of his friends videotaped him at a Rubik's competition and put the video on YouTube. He added some music and "Paper Planes" was the song he put at the end. I still watch it sometimes. The video, the song - to me it's all so happy and young and hopeful. It was a time before all the sorrow and it seems like Mason is on top of the world. I miss that version of our world.


So, is it about music, grief, nostalgia, connecting the dots? Is it about believing in the beauty in this world, just as it is, in spite of everything, and loving the weirdness of it all? I don't know. It's been over a week. Are the signs done for now?  Maybe, in the trying to figure it out, it's simply a message to get off my butt and start writing on this blog again. Maybe. That's a good one. The final sign could be related to this bizarre google +1 thing that happened to one of my previous posts. I'm sure it's a fluke or a bug or a mistake or something but for one tiny second - ok for a few days - I started thinking "What if? What if thousands and thousands of people - strangers - really liked something I wrote?" That would be incredible. Could I have that? Could that happen to me?

Maya Angelo said "A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song." Anyway, my day planner with inspirational, bird-related quotes said she said that. Reading that quote today felt like yet another piece toward the answer. An answer to what? I'm not sure but maybe if I keep writing something will be revealed.