Wherein I go back and explain myself...

A couple months or so ago, I got all hyper and wrote a post on some of my experiences with raising an inquisitive daughter in this modern, sometimes superficial, often mind numbing world of constant stimulation. It’s plain to see that when I wrote the post I had a lot of questions and very few answers. I still don’t have any answers. All I can say for sure is that something just doesn’t feel right. I want my kid to have a more peaceful childhood- a more childish childhood- grounded in family traditions, imagination, and all of the silly messy goodness of being a kid. I want to encourage an awareness of the natural world around her, a deep respect for life on earth. 

I want, I want, and still I wonder.

I wonder because other parents are pretty good at leading us to doubt ourselves, and kids certainly have an interesting way of keeping us humble, don't they? In the day-to-day of it all these things can be difficult to make sense of. Some days end with me exhausted and tearful; others begin that way. But when I go to say my prayers and reflect on life in the quiet comfort of solitude I can finally let go of that fearful competitive streak. I lay aside my armor and realize that I only want my daughter to know for certain she is loved, she is important, she is a miracle; that if she governs her life by fear then she will kill herself trying not to live it; that there is no other soul on this planet quite like her and, since we are not Hindu, this earthly life is probably the only one she’s got.  

I know she won’t feel confident or secure every day of her life. I know that she has the power to break her own heart, and I know that in my fervent attempts to nurture her strengths I may end up doing more harm than good. I know all these things as both a woman and as a girl who is still trying to figure out how to be one.

Mostly, though, I know better than to pretend I understand who my daughter is more than she does. I can’t say for sure that this world is a bad place. It definitely seems that way sometimes from where I stand, but I can’t be certain it even has the balls to corrupt her. Maybe she will be a stronger woman than I give her credit for. But it is my responsibility to do what I can to prepare her for those things just in case, and the only way I know to do that is to trust my own intuition.

 

I am the Highway

I am the summer solstice, with its foiled windows; a canopy of light that gives the illusion of safety. I am home videos and oatmeal and karaoke and a pen that bends. I am Kathy Mattea, walking on tiptoes; a strange iridescent lamp, whose needles break off easily, making it impossible to step into the bedroom without sharp pain underfoot. My mom is running after me and my dad can’t hold the camcorder steady to save his life. I am flying down a snowy hill on a red sled and it feels like home.

I am the other side of the country. Where men go to lose their minds. My hair smells of pine; it is covered in sand from the neighborhood playground. I am aerobics in the living room and Easter Parade Hats and an ink drawing of a thunderstorm in the local paper. My mom is seven feet tall and I am learning that I should not use “ducklings” more than once in the same sentence of my story… and wondering why that is. I am a classroom with two teachers; a room full of other army brats just like me. Their dads aren’t home a whole lot either, but their dads don’t offend the teachers by saying books without words are not really books.

I am the highway; a long car ride to a magical land of Sunflowers and cousins and working mothers. My best friend is coming with me. She runs beside the car. She sometimes rolls along the hills. I am the grass beneath her; the flowers she picks along the way. I am country music and the sunset over a Texaco sign. I am aware that I probably know too much, and so I pretend to know nothing.

I am straight bangs and dirty hands and high-waters; a new school and then another, where there are only white kids and I am totally freaked out by that.  And then, almost overnight, I am unwanted attention and late night phone calls. I am awkward and I say all the wrong things. I am fairly certain I don’t belong, but then again, none of us really do. I am in awe of the tiny freshman girl who spins around in the rain during lunch; ashamed that the other students make fun of her; sympathetic because I know they will never feel that free. But I am mostly sad because I will never feel that free.

I am savagely beautiful but heartbreakingly unaware. And then I barely have time to exhale before I am first kisses I’d rather forget, pickup trucks, football games, 3am bonfires, abandoned houses, haunted cornfields, uninhibited laughter, shy smiles, busted window screens, parties I wasn’t invited to…and maybe a secret even I couldn’t keep. I am spinning times.

I am so much more than all of that.

(inspired by the poem “I am from…” by Meredith Winn)

And I’m wondering…who are you?