an honest rollercoaster

how every life contains multitudes

7:48pm and all’s well.
David comes out onto the front porch. Sam is in bed. The dogs wander in and out of the front door (read: in and out of the broken screen door they tore through) and I am allowing my eyes to glaze over and stare at my computer screen.

I haven’t written in a while and it shows.

It shows in how sad my insides feel. Can your colon feel sad? Can a liver feel sad? Not in a cheeky way, but truly—can you feel the sadness and disconnection so deeply you think your organs are responding to it as well? If so, then that’s what I feel.

But I have a chance to rectify the ennui. I can sit and type and try to find my way through the endless abyss of what has been the last few eternal weeks.

There is so much truth, beauty, and goodness in cultures who build in breaks throughout their days. Spain, Greece, Italy—all have pauses in the midst of the hustle. A nap is taken, a longer meal enjoyed, the watercolor book is pulled out, a stroll in the neighborhood is enjoyed all midday. Like they know the body and mind are supposed to rest and not just when the sun gives us no other choice. Like they know that life is not some thing to get through, but to be in.

So they rest and soak up something other than work.

They soak up being.

king arthur, in the flesh

carnival rides

I didn’t sign up for this.

This is such a common sentence. I have said it (or rather, thought it) more times than I can count.

The last month has been trying. We have a child who’s made of stardust. The kid is magic. I’ll say it until I’m without breath. He wants to make friends with everyone he meets, is a true enthusiast, and my God can he knock the wind right out of me.

And he does. In every way.

I wonder if the thoughts I have while parenting him are anything like what a mere mythological mortal had while parenting a demi-god. They saw the great power their child possessed and how rare they were and how that child had the absolute ability to rule worlds or destroy them. And as the parent, they had to fan the flame of goodness and gently tamp down the fires of destruction. All while making a sandwich.

It’s a damn thing, y’all.

Currently, Sam isn’t allowing David or I to leave the house at night before we put him to sleep. Even if one parent is there, the other is not allowed to say “I’ll see you in the morning” without a meltdown akin to Chernobyl. We thought we were past this, but trauma has a funny way of taking new forms. We have also seen an uptick in intensified behaviors the next day after one of us has an evening engagement. We lose hours the next day and sometimes, this extends into the following week. Sam’s body says “they’re leaving! Don’t let them go!” even though we always give notice and go through the liturgies of “you are safe, you are loved, I am coming back.” But it seemingly makes no difference. So we stay home, together. Patterns, schedules, routines are sacred and we guard them like Cerebus guards Hades. And we thank Heaven above when the next day feels more like Purgation rather than the Devil’s armpit.

It’s a ride.

Technically, foster/adoptive parents do “sign up for this”. We take classes, read books, have mentors, talk to other parents in our shoes. But at the trauma carnival, all any of us know is that our kids will take us on a ride. But we won’t always know which one we’re on.

This is not for you to feel sorry for me. Yes, I wake up and my adrenaline immediately spikes and my hands shake because mornings are an unpredictable hell, but if that’s me—child of privilege, deep love, and chocolate milkshakes—what is my child, who is presumably causing the hell feeling inside his body? What is his brain doing? Does his skin feel like it’s crawling? What neurons are misfiring? If I’m on a rollercoaster, is he on a crazy swinging pendulum and the base is coming up off the ground? Are screws flying loose while he’s strapped in? What is he feeling?

I signed up for this. He didn’t.

homemade lightsabers by the coolest dad around

time travel

I have often said that if I could go back and sit on the bed of 16 year old Emily, I’m not sure I’d give her any details as to what’s coming. I’d just tell her that it’s not what she imagined.

Post college I felt immediately stuck as I chose a path that was safe, but unfulfilling. Three years postgrad, I started taking more risks and haven’t really stopped. In modern culture that often translates as “I traveled the world, fell in love, fell out of love, found myself, and am now spending time in an ashram before returning to the organic skincare company I started in the bay area” but alas, I am not that sexy. Instead, I moved coasts with my parents, married a guy in a barn, pushed our way out of a cult-like reformationist subculture, only to be “cool” for five minutes before becoming foster parents in a pandemic. And then moving to Eastern Washington because, you know, that’s “where it’s happenin’”.

But they were risks. And I took them. I didn’t stay in Arkansas and continue teaching at the god-awful high school I attended as a teen. I got to be with my mother when she breathed her last breath and I got to meet my son at the top of a global pandemic. Kismet? Fate? God, Jesus, Bible? The latter most likely, but less trite.

It’s been a ride. The whole of it up until this moment where I sit, with the porch light on, and a mosquito going for the jugular.

I didn’t sign up for this. Neither did 16 year old Emily. Que sera. Here we be.

an honest rollercoaster

Today, Sam and I took the route we take about hundred times a week. From central to north Spokane, we run a groove in the Monroe to Wall Street road. In order to get home from the North, we drive down a hill that curves left and right before flattening out about ten blocks until home.

We have made it a habit to put our hands in the air at the top of the hill and say “wheeeee!” as we slide down it. Windows are often rolled down and I’ll take the curves a tad more aggressively, allowing Sam’s body to sway from one side to another, eliciting a “whoooooaaa” and smiles from ear to ear. At the base of the hill is a sign, welcoming us to our neighborhood with a smiling glass sun mosaic at the top. Sam always makes it a point to say “hi, sun!” once we level out, signaling the end of our rollercoaster ride and the beginning of a straight shot home.

There’s a metaphor in there somewhere and you don’t have to look hard for it.

I didn’t sign up to live at a carnival, but here we be, and honestly, there are worst places to live. Carnivals also have music, and laughter, moments of pure wonder, joy, and fear. They are made of spun sugar and moments of pain from overindulgence. It’s crowded and noisy and when you find a moment of quiet, it is a gift. But so is the noise. The cacophony is a rush and its own teacher. And every once in a while, you get the chance to sit on a grassy hill (hopefully with a corndog) and look down at the lights and the music and the mess and see that it’s all transient. And that noticing is its own gift.

So I sit and notice. Because I can again.
I notice how sweet the “See Rock City” birdhouse looks tucked underneath our willow tree. A fun Hoos household easter egg that you can only experience when sitting on the porch or standing directly underneath it.

I notice that the pinot blanc David brought out has a tiny bite to it—odd for the “white tshirt of wines” but there you go. Maybe we let it sit too long. Whites aren’t meant to be cellared. But bite or no, it still does the trick.

There’s a mussed beach blanket the color of Baja Blast™ in our front yard where Sam and I sat under that willow and had lunch earlier today. He had sprawled out on his back, arm flopped over his eyes to protect him from the sun, bare feet buried in the fuzz of our younger dog who also lay prostrate in the free D’s of the sun.

At some point, the carnival will end. We’ll get off the rides and slide down the hill home. I pray it’s not too soon. I hope I get another chance to find ways to cling to our sanity when the floor is coming up from under us. Maybe we’ll get to sit in the sun, one arm flopped over eyes with a sandwich in hand. Maybe we’ll fight our way off a ride that had our backs pinned to a wall. Either way, we’ll get to the end and only then will we really know what it was all for.

Always,
Emily

P.S. If you’re feeling caught on a carnival ride of your own, my best advice is to stick your toes in the fuzz of a sweet and highly tolerant dog. And maybe pray a few Hail Mary’s. Both have merit.