Valentine’s Day morning, and the teenager seems unshakeable, as in, I couldn’t wake him up for school. The little gal’s fever broke Saturday night. She continued to cling to me all day Sunday and she’s coughing and clearly not herself (“Carry me, carry me, I’m so tired”) all day and night and many tears and night terrors. I have a ton of work to do. It’ll sit there like a pile of snow, mocking me. At least I have a visual. Our town is one pile of snow.
Do I sound like I’m at the end of my proverbial rope?
I really and truly am (although fear not, not in an extreme way, which I guess we all have to qualify now; the end of the rope can’t be mentioned casually this month by mothers of teenagers).
**
Many years ago when Ezekiel was three and Lucien was seven months, I had a wintry moment akin, in its way, to this one: both little guys (plus their papa and our friend-slash-housemate at the time Michael) were terribly ill. I have glimpses in my memory bank, the heat of the babes, the slow, scary drive through a snowstorm to the doctor then the hospital to a chest x-ray for the infant, who got into that plastic encasement with his pudgy hands aloft like tassels over his head and proceeded not to cry (when he was supposed to be crying, for the purpose of lung expansion). He did not have pneumonia after all. I remember not sleeping and the grey-purple light outside the window and wanting to make them all better and wanting to put them down. I mean I desperately wanted to put them down, just for a minute or three.
At the doctor’s office, the very kind doctor (herself a mama) said, “You’ll remember this for the rest of your life.” It was just about as kind a thing as anyone could have said to me at that moment. She validated how hard it was to have everyone so sick, how scary, how big, how absorbing and how draining.
There were some big-ticket hard illnesses hovering close around us then, too. I was pretty much drowning in exhaustion and sadness.
The first day the kids seemed a wee bit better, there happened to be a thaw, a winter’s thaw and I walked through puddles to town and had a frozen yogurt. People wore t-shirts that forty-degree day. They were smiling. The moisture in the air did feel (nearly) tropical. I let the sun seep into my cheeks, blind my eyes. I let the drip-drips sound musical. I stomped through the slushy puddles in my boots. It was a joyful little stolen moment I guess I’ll never forget, either.
**
Monday morning and the little girl’s not better enough for school (no fever, but still coughing and just… fragile and very tired). Valentine’s Day morning and the second grader is not feeling well, either; we’re trying to wait a little while to see if it’s just a tired morning or he’s at the beginning of the fever illness.
My neck and shoulder are aching and I feel totally stranded. My heart’s a little droopy this morning and certainly not a confident shiny red.
Yet, in the midst of everything, there have been all these small but significant kindnesses and I took a picture of the second grader’s origami creations ready to go and felt giddy with his lovely eight year-old industry (he put candy hearts in them, those pastel ones with messages dropped off by a friend; he’s carefully rejected Kiss Me and Be Mine). The lovely Molly at GoBerry sent us some frozen yogurt Friday night (oh so dreamy LIME, by bike messenger no less). A dear friend called this morning ready to take on the school committee for a later start to the high school’s days (too late; it’s been done and failed but I loved her fierce resolve). And Grandma? She saved the day about umpteen times over this weekend.
It’s supposed to be forty degrees today, a real live Valentine’s gift. I pretty much have to figure out how to go outside. I’m certain that if I do I’ll find my joyful stolen moment and this whole solo-week-homebound-by-child’s-illness-weekend experience will find its context, the twist that lets me hold it tenderly. Why do I believe I haven’t really reached the end? Because, don’t you know, there’s always more to the story.
