These past few weeks, I've been inspired by, and reminded of, the remarkable resilience of my daughter. (And children in general.) Within a span of twenty-two days the girl has been through a quadruple tooth extraction, a series of visits with, and examinations by, several medical specialists, ultrasounds and MRIs, surgery, and today, her streak of health related matters capped off, literally, by the gold brackets and silver wiring of her shiny new braces. On her twelfth birthday, no less.
And not one complaint.
She, as well as all the other children we encountered along this course of medicinal forays, has worn the same determined warrior-face for each run along the path.
And me, fretting over a job interview for a position I've never held, in an industry I know little about. Not much to fret there, really. Certainly not by comparison.
But dealing with numerous and lengthy internet interruptions? (Cox Communications—can anyone tell me if FiOS is more reliable?) That's serious. I'll be lucky to find an open window in which to throw out this post.
Today, my girl is twelve. Twelve! I could never have imagined what I was to be confronted with in those dozen years now past. (And what to come?) Even though I had been a mother—an older mother, at that—for two years when Lulu was born, I was entirely unprepared for what would follow.
No one warned me of the degree to which my mental resilience would be tested by motherhood. Hell, by everything. But I won't bore you with tangential elaboration. You understand.
Anyway, I saw Ann Hood quote Allen Ginsberg on Facebook today. (Ann is a fellow Rhode Islander.) “Follow your inner moonlight; don't hide the madness” she wrote on her wall.
Speaking of such, I now see my window of opportunity in which to fling my inner moonlight and madness... while a few escalating bars flicker access in the lower right hand corner of my laptop, and before Lu and I go get a manicure and, later, meet up with her father and brother at Cuban Revolution to have dinner, listen to some jazz, and celebrate the astonishing miracle of Lu's birth, and what she brings to the world.
My muse. How I love her.
I think it's time for a to return to normal, don't you?
If you don't have Buena Vista Social Club in your music library, you may want to start here.
And thanks so much to all of you who've been so kind, patient and supportive through all of this. I've been unable to keep up with many of you, but I'll be by to visit this weekend (if Cox permits, ugh).
