On Saturday night I sat down on the floor beneath Beatrice's loft bed (after a decent effort we concluded it was too scary up there for sleeping, so long ago we slid another mattress into the ingenious space-saving nook beneath and kicked the furniture back out into her crowded tiny bedroom). She beckoned me closer, to snuggle for her bedtime routine, so I stretched out long next to her and wrapped an arm around her tidy ribs.
How old will I be when Didi goes to college?
I had to think. Hmmm...you'll be ten.
And what about Gabriel?
Then you'll be thirteen.
Silence. We lay entangled, our private thoughts about that eventuality unraveling within us.
It will be just us.
I know.
I told her I've thought about that a lot. Will we be lonely for them? Will we love being a pair, or will we find it unsettling and fill the house with friends?
As we talked more about it, Beatrice became increasingly concerned about what it might be like for us to be alone, until suddenly she looked at me and said, but wait - I've been thinking about this as if I will be the same eight year old person when they go away! I'll be so much older, I'll probably feel differently about things then.
I agreed, and brought up all the teenagery things she sees her older siblings doing now that she will probably want to do then. It will feel really different, to be so much older. But that ushered in a whole new wave of discomfort. The shift was palpable.
...But I don't want to be really different. I want to be me.
Ah, but you will be! You'll be YOU, just older and wiser, more and more yourself. Beatrice, you're more you every day, all the time. It's so cool.
This brought some relief, and the freedom to pursue a series of math challenges and figure out how old everyone in our family will be when she is fifteen and eighteen and twenty-two. It felt exhilarating to both of us, imagining all the incredible futures ahead, all the things we have yet to experience, what it will be like to be a family of young adults, doing extraordinary things out in the world and loving each other through it all.
But as the numbers got older (especially mine, in relation to theirs) I could feel a dark turn towards mortality waiting in the wings and so put an end to our endless bedtime routine, extracted myself from the pile of blankets and pillows on the floor, and said goodnight.
Don't go!!
I'm going. Goodnight Beatrice. It's very late.
Can I read?
Yes, but only for a few minutes.
I went upstairs to say goodnight to Gabriel, and almost cried as I shut his door in parting, imagining him as a twenty year old (which is how old he'll be when Beatrice is fifteen, as we had just discovered).
I went down to the kitchen to give the animals their last bit of care for the day and lock the doors and turn out the lights. I remembered how Beatrice said earlier: I love today! I think this is one of the best days of my life. Nothing particularly amazing had happened. The older kids had had their second vaccine shots the day before and were feeling low energy, thus we scrapped some other plans. They were off the hook for chores and we watched Sing Street together in the middle of the day. I blasted The Cure afterwards, and made a plan for us to go to the beach in July. Beatrice and I went to our friends' house for a little garden party and she practiced her cartwheels on the pristine lawn. I grilled hamburgers for dinner. I always feel like a badass widow when I use our grill. We ate on the front porch and watched people with their dogs wandering by in the lavish evening humidity.
It was a beautifully uneventful, unbusy Saturday, and we spent it together. It was one of the best days of Beatrice's life.
No wonder she worries about the changes ahead. I do too.
The thing is, I notice myself oriented towards the unknowable future often and casually considering the present to be transitional, in-between, on-the-way-towards. On the way towards what exactly, I'm not sure. A time when I'm a better therapist, more knowledgable and authoritative? Maybe a time when our house is as it should be instead of in-process, when the walls are all painted and the washing machine doesn't leak. When my body has achieved optimum fitness and strength, when my hair color is just right, when my dog has developed some modicum of impulse control and doesn't bark at the neighbors. When I write that book already. And when I have fallen in love again with a beautiful wise and funny man with whom I will want to share all this poignant, abundant, messy life.
Because then this scrambling grieving widow interlude will end, and prove to have been the creme center of an Oreo, sandwiched between chocolatey parts one and two.
The only problem with being in-between the times when my real life happens is that it makes zero sense. How could I think my life isn't already real, here and now, all the time? If I believe myself to be treading water, waiting for something new, something better, to happen, I will entirely miss the fact that I am a fucking ace swimmer, and that I've been kicking out towards the vast horizon for a long time now.
Sometimes I practice this little Tara Brach thing to help me remember. I recommend it. Basically, whatever is happening, you respond with yes. I tried it last night while I was squinting in the sun, waiting for an outdoor choral concert to which I had brought Beatrice and our friend Annika early, in preparation for their performance. Yes. I'm hot, it will be another hour til the concert, I don't know a soul here, I'm irritable, yes. Those yeses encouraged me to wander around until I found a sweet library porch with comfortable chairs where I could read. Yes to my novel, yes to words. Yes to the sadness that overwhelmed me while I was listening to their beautiful music and Mike's absence squeezed my heart. (That yes invited tears that had been patiently waiting to come out). Yes to the sweaty summer crowd of families all around me, still a novelty. (That yes brought a smile). Yes to cicadas falling from the sky. (That yes, a laugh, tickled by their absurdity). Yes to not being able to find the car afterwards. Yes, definitely yes, to an ice cream stop on the way home, yes to licking towering cones of soft serve and sitting at a shabby picnic table at a country intersection, billboards and a shadowy crane dark against the sky that glowed its last gasp in brilliant pinks and oranges before the darkness fell, and it was finally time to go home.
I love walking to school with Beatrice. We have one more morning to go before second grade is over. Last week, we were playing a game on our way, and she dared me to tango across an intersection with her. Well, that yes was an easy one. Yes to tango. Yes to silly. A couple of days later, a woman waved us down near the school.
I saw you two tangoing across the street the other day. I was waiting at the red light and you danced in front of me!
Beatrice started to turn red and covered her face. She peered at me between her fingers and whispered I'm so embarrassed.
I smiled at her. I smiled at the woman. Yeah, I admitted. That was us.
You guys made me happy all day long. I just wanted to thank you. It was awesome.
That was it. She waved, we waved. That was my life happening, right here and now.
I got distracted with something and forgot to tell Beatrice to turn out the lights on Saturday, after our long talk about growing older together. I ran back up the stairs and saw her light on and groaned. It was after 11. I'm so bad at facilitating healthy sleep for that girl.
I called out, Beatrice! Lights out!
She didn't respond, so I went in and found her sound asleep on her back, a book tucked under one arm, her face turned away from me, beautifully lit in profile by the warm glow of her reading light. She was wearing one of my shirts.
Beatrice won't be eight forever. We know, we've done the math. But she is eight today! To which I say yes.
