Thursday, March 1, 2012

A Confusion

I think it's the weather but I'm not sure but then again, neither is the weather. One minute it is gun-metal gray, flat and ominous overhead, every bird call an Alfred Hitchcockian/Poe shrill raven cry of forewarning and foreboding. An hour later, the sun is flat-blasting the earth and the earth steams from all the rain and wet and it's so humid the walls of the house cry sacred tears of moisture like some Mary in a church- oh! it's a miracle, no it's not, it means nothing but more mold, that's the only meaning in that and the birds gather and cackle and chip and chirp but still they sound concerned- a snake in a nest?

Every cliche is coming to mind and spring cleaning and spring fever, foremost among them at this second. I open a window, long winter-shut, and the space between screen and sill is black with Lloyd dirt, I could (should) spend days with bucket and rags, mops and brooms. I should (do) throw open windows and doors, I should (do not) pick out paint colors, scrub mildew off walls.

My brain is as addled as the weather. I swear- I cannot focus it on one thing but feel a desperate need to rush and hurry and do and yet, do not want to do any of it, not one damn thing. Oh. I do not know.

When Owen is here I can't keep my hands off that head, I want to stroke his hair, I want to touch his cheeks, I want to run my finger over the rim of a perfect ear and when he says, "MerMer no wash dishes. Play chess with Owen!" I want to die and yet, I stand at the sink like some mean old scrinch-faced harridan, and I say, "No, Owen, I have to wash these dishes!" and I don't even know why. No one HAS to wash the dishes. And when he leaves he says, "MerMer come Owen's house?" and part of me wants to just jump in the car and go with him because I can't bear to let him go and part of me can't wait for a moment to myself, oh, please...a moment. To myself. For myself.
I am so selfish with these moments. They seem to be so few and far between that I cannot decide on what it is I want or need to do with them and they leak out of my hands like sand, like puffs of air, spring air that tinkles the windchimes, that lifts the yellow pollen and carries it away.

And then- I see my mother and where she is and how she is and I think, oh god, she is only twenty-seven years older than I am, and do you know how quickly twenty-seven years can go by? Like that, like that puff of air, take in a breath, let it out, there you go. Gone. And then, if I am still alive, my moments will stretch like eternity and my mind, my body won't let me do a damn thing with those moments and that makes me feel crazier, more frantic to use whatever time I have in the best way possible and in what way? How?

Shhh, shhh, shhh.

I am doing it, I am spring-fever time-tripping, I am back when it smelled and felt this way thirty years ago, ten years ago, last year. This is what change-of-season does. It wipes away everything but pure visceral remembering. These bird calls, this air-feel, this light-slant, this dirt-smell, this exact temperature and humidity, this sound of tiller, windchime song, this sight of sky from gray to blue, these blossoms, this yearning, longing, reaching, waiting.

Wondering.

And yet, this is now, or, is it? I do not understand time nor how it works and I don't think anyone does except perhaps those few with brains that fire completely and correctly who can hold concepts of vibrating strands of connectivity throughout the universe while the rest of us are stuck here with air-on-skin, with eyes-to-sky, with body filled with this season's red blood, pulsed through by this one life-to-death beating heart and I almost feel the need of some old remedy, a bleeding, perhaps, by leaches or barber's sharp razor, but this is not a treatment we espouse any more and so we are left with all of this blood, frothed to high volume with spring, perhaps, until we don't know whether to dance or collapse, to sing or to sob, to cradle to us or to push away from us.

It is a confusing time of year, of life, of everything. For me, at least.

I am just being honest and should go plant something or clean something or perhaps just sit silently and weep at either the beauty of life happening again and again or of the certain dark inevitability of death, I do not know and am not sure it matters, call it what you will.

And you? Do you feel this way?

Here we are, we puny humans, we tiny unknowable, entirely predictable creatures and the birds are either singing of hunger or life or danger or all of it. I think we can call it love and leave it at that.

16 comments:

  1. It all rolls into the sea. Rolls and rolls. My mother and I are 27 years apart and my son and I are 27 years apart too.
    xo

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  2. "Does anybody realize what life is while they're living it - every, every minute?"

    "No. Saints and poets, maybe."

    I think we are both poets, MM. You are, at least. This post made me think of this quote, and knowing you were Emily makes it all the more appropriate :)

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  3. Madame King- Why am I not surprised? And funny, as I was writing this, I was thinking of how the water absorbs it all, every earth-breath, every wind whisper. True.

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  4. SJ- Funny how much that role defined who it was that I grew up as.

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  5. We all feel it, i think, if we don't let ourselves get so cynical as to ignore it.

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  6. That was breathtaking. You are indeed a poet. You live and think and dance like a poet Ms. M and you danced that poetry right across the page.

    But not a saint...hahaha , thank god,no, not a saint :)

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  7. I am doing it, I am spring-fever time-tripping, I am back when it smelled and felt this way thirty years ago, ten years ago, last year. This is what change-of-season does. It wipes away everything but pure visceral remembering. These bird calls, this air-feel, this light-slant, this dirt-smell, this exact temperature and humidity, this sound of tiller, windchime song, this sight of sky from gray to blue, these blossoms, this yearning, longing, reaching, waiting.

    Wondering.

    And yet, this is now, or, is it?

    I don't know how to explain to you how beautiful and perfect this post was, how it put into words something I feel every spring especially (but every season change, like you said) and it makes me so confused and crazy too, "Is it now?" is indeed the question. When spring comes I have these blissed out strange moments when I feel like a little girl in a pink crinkley zip up spring jacket, thinking I have my whole life ahead of me, thinking I might be happy.

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  8. messymimi- You may be right.

    liv- Oh HELL no. Not a saint.

    Bethany- Oh sweetie. Oh, darling. Yes. It goes back that far, doesn't it?
    And yes, you can be happy. I swear it. You might be surprised.

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  9. I do feel that there are not that many really good years left--I may live to be 95 like my mother but what about activity level. I want to keep physically able to do the things that I love. I don't want to sit in some wheel chair some place and wait to die.

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  10. Another post for a Pulitzer price Ms Moon... You have a way with words like none of us other mortals have... I am not sure if spring coming is good for you or not, but the writing about it and your confusion is devine.

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  11. Well again you have blown my mind with your words, so clearly a gifted writer, I am envious of the way you can place words on a page and they dance right at you, capturing the moment and moods so clearly... I think we are all much of a muchness in this time thing and ageing.. but inside our hearts we are eternally young.. Thank you for sharing.. I know how much housework I should really be doing, but prefer to sit and read all the blogs and posts that are out there instead! Have a great weekend Mrs M- all the best from the other side of the pond!!

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  12. Ms Moon you are such a gifted, talented, superb, amazing writer. Others have said this before me. I think this is one of the most beautiful, relatable pieces of writing I've ever read. I feel honored to be able to come here and relax with you and read about your life, especially the way you conceive it. I could analyze each of your sentences and write you paragraphs on how much I could relate to your thoughts. It fills my heart. Thank you! (Now if I can type these two words in right to leave this comment, my day will be made!) Joanne

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  13. This transition with my mother - moving her into a home is messing with my head too. She is lonely - her friends are all gone and she despairs of meeting anyone who will share her interests (there would be few). And her mind is going - no doubt - she has a few ruts she lives in. New memories don't take well. She frets and worries. She is 37 years older and I see her and I feel my body failing now and I wonder if I could bear to live another 40 years. Surely not. I have wasted so much time trying to build the will to do the things I'd like to do and still do not do them. My life turns on what others want me to do. Without that, I have no direction. But my belly is in the shape of a D so I must be waxing.

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  14. Syd- The years are nothing if they are not good ones. Quality versus quantity, right?

    Photocat- Yep. I'll just put that Pulitzer up there on the shelf with all the others...
    Hahahahahahahaha!
    Thanks, sugar.

    Janzi- And all of the best back to you across that wide water.

    Joanne- To write something that others can read and say about, "Oh. I know. Me too." Well, that is everything to me.

    Jeannie- Those last lines- oh yes. I know. And my belly is waxing too! Lovely. And so true.

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  15. Dear Ms Moon, at the moment I am too tired to be confused but once I get over the jet lag, I'll be right there with you. Recently I felt I was standing smack dab firmly in the middle of my life and it had this sort of numbing...pausing affect. At the crossroads, which way do I go sort of affect. But there is no which way, there is only one foot in front of the other way.
    Love,
    yo

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  16. A perfect and wonderful post, Mrs. Moon. I find this decade of our lives so tender and real. Life feels finite, and I expect that realization to intensify.

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