ma
i'll do just about anything not to go to sleep. when i was nine it was crying at the end of the hallway until mom loosened the chokehold on my bedtime: i could stay in the living room and watch *M*A*S*H* with everyone. if i was quiet. and no questions. 11pm was it.
(who the hell can sleep though the conversation and laughter of a couple of parents and 4-5 other kids and a tv blaring the best show of the decade?! even caesar, our dog, got to hang out--sprawled on the outskirts of the mess of bodies. so i'd hang back, barely breaking the rules, waiting just waiting for someone to take pity on me, to do the right thing, to take me in, to want me. love me, my whimpering whimpered.)
"c'mon, kid," i waited for. "don't mope. oh stop it. c'mon."
sometimes it happened. the *M*A*S*H* nights. i would lay on the couch, quiet, with my head on mom's lap and the world roared around me. hawkeye, b.j., eric, steve, paula, dad. caesar. ma, her fingers in my hair, along my back, warm and perfect. oil of olay on her face. opaque nightie. scratchy aqua robe. love.
there's nothing like belonging. like sleeping in the afternoon. sun through the window warming the body on the couch, curled just so. drowsy. drowsier. and waking to the same soft sunshine and having an entire evening and night to procrastinate bedtime.
tonight it's blue chips and guac. then a book by couchside lamplight.
i must have looked at the calendar, even called out the date 3 or 4 times today for colleagues, over cube walls, down hallways, and i just realized. today's the anniversary of her--well, actually, her missingness, but a body goes into hypothermia and death very quickly in single digit temperatures and water. 23 years. damn. no wonder i wanted to cry at my desk. couldn't put my finger on it. but it's memory. like muscle memory. then the head catches up. like tonight. like sitting at the end of the hallway, my own arms wrapped around scrawny white legs, indian style, waiting for those other arms. hers. in scratchy aqua robe. warm. just waiting.
(who the hell can sleep though the conversation and laughter of a couple of parents and 4-5 other kids and a tv blaring the best show of the decade?! even caesar, our dog, got to hang out--sprawled on the outskirts of the mess of bodies. so i'd hang back, barely breaking the rules, waiting just waiting for someone to take pity on me, to do the right thing, to take me in, to want me. love me, my whimpering whimpered.)
"c'mon, kid," i waited for. "don't mope. oh stop it. c'mon."
sometimes it happened. the *M*A*S*H* nights. i would lay on the couch, quiet, with my head on mom's lap and the world roared around me. hawkeye, b.j., eric, steve, paula, dad. caesar. ma, her fingers in my hair, along my back, warm and perfect. oil of olay on her face. opaque nightie. scratchy aqua robe. love.
there's nothing like belonging. like sleeping in the afternoon. sun through the window warming the body on the couch, curled just so. drowsy. drowsier. and waking to the same soft sunshine and having an entire evening and night to procrastinate bedtime.
tonight it's blue chips and guac. then a book by couchside lamplight.
i must have looked at the calendar, even called out the date 3 or 4 times today for colleagues, over cube walls, down hallways, and i just realized. today's the anniversary of her--well, actually, her missingness, but a body goes into hypothermia and death very quickly in single digit temperatures and water. 23 years. damn. no wonder i wanted to cry at my desk. couldn't put my finger on it. but it's memory. like muscle memory. then the head catches up. like tonight. like sitting at the end of the hallway, my own arms wrapped around scrawny white legs, indian style, waiting for those other arms. hers. in scratchy aqua robe. warm. just waiting.
posted by stacy muszynski at 10:18 PM
1 Comments:
Five and a half years since I lost my father suddenly and what I have found is that it's not the anniversary of his death that gets me the most. I can anticipate and dread that date every year...all year...knowing that it will come as surely as snow in winter in this frozen wasteland. No, it's the little things. It's the subtle reminders I get from time to time, reminding me how his "missingness" (I love that word! Can I use it sometime?) punched a hole in me with such force that the bruising remains angry purple with knuckle marks...even today.
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