If you dip the cookie in the frosting, pick it up slowly, turn it over, sway it a little side to side and front to back, the frosting will level itself out. I don’t know how it knows, but it does. It’s the gift before the giving.
I think we’re all given the tools. Right from the start. Oh, sure, it takes a little turning. A little swaying. But when you know. You know.
I used to go into my room at five years old and color my emotions. I didn’t have the words for what I was feeling, but I had 24 Crayolas that could relay the message. At six, — as Mrs. Bergstrom gave us the spelling, the words — I began to write poems. Thus began this cookie’s life of self leveling. And the real gift is, I now have something to give.
I’m not special. We’re all given the tools. Maybe you garden. Maybe you bake. Or build. Or teach.
Yesterday, after painting in the studio, feeling the magic of this new portrait beginning, I wanted to call my mom. Oh, how she loved magic!! And perhaps frosting even more. So I returned to the kitchen, dipped the cookies that I had made earlier that day, and turned and swayed and leveled myself in all that love, and somehow I knew she knew.
To be clear, my mind often wandered and wondered. Maybe that’s why when the clues came, they did so in the brightest of reds to get my attention.
Standing on the wood gymnasium floor, not really feeling the need to disappear, after all, what was to notice? My no brand tennis shoes? My misshapen JCPenney gym uniform? My unsettled hair, still damp from the morning shower? And yet, when I wondered, as I mentioned I often did, whether I was lovable or not, whether the blurred red tailgate of my father’s truck had left forever, whether these boys, these near men in our combined gym class once a week, would imagine my hair blown dry and curled, my heels lifted off the ground, whether they could ask me on a date, and love me with no thought of trucks, or tire tracks or leaving of any kind — red was the answer that came racing for me, in the form of a big Cardinal on his gym sweats, holding a red leather ball to be hurled and smack the wonder out of my soon to be reddened face, with the answer NO.
I don’t know when I took back the color. Gave myself a new answer. But I did. It’s funny how the same place you can be lost, is exactly where you can be found.
Would I have done it, if I hadn’t seen my mother do the same? Place her red badge of courage on rubied lips behind her own YES? Behind the yes of worth and joy and love. I’ll never have to wonder about that.
I put out a little bowl of red candies in front of her Christmas photo. She stands in front of giant red-bowed lion and wrapped gift in front of the Art Institute in Chicago. And in this season, I am reminded the greatest gift of all, may be to simply start with yes.
When you love something, you want to share it. In my youth, I used to think that meant that the other person not only had to love it, but love it for the same reasons. Childish, I know, but I’d like to think I’ve gotten better, more secure. It is more than enough to simply love.
I enjoy making Christmas cookies. Thanks to a childhood friend, I have one cutter in the shape of Minnesota. Of course no one here in France knows what it is, but the shape of my home state is just as delicious as the Christmas tree, or the star, and they enjoy it. Sometimes I watch. I smile when I think, oh, my husband just took a bite of Duluth, and that same shape that rests in my heart, without his knowledge or permission, is colored in the morning blue of a fresh snow, and is silently full.
Is that what love has always been? If so, what a relief to know it is in the giving that we become filled. Oh, the stress of waiting and wanting to receive… So I offer my love, in all the shapes and colors I know, and find myself with more than I ever could have asked for. And I am saved.
It was one of the best compliments ever. They were visiting us from the US. After getting ready for the day, he said of my bathroom, “It was like showering in the Louvre.” I’m still beaming.
Sunday afternoons were always ripe for the dreaming when I was a young girl. Saturdays, my mother did laundry and catch-up work. We often snuck in a trip to the mall if my homework was done. And it always was, by Friday night. Which left the sweet spot of Sunday afternoon, hovering between the rush of Saturday and Monday’s panic that arrived late Sunday evening.
In our small apartment, it wasn’t unusual to wish for space. “And if I had a big house,” she said, “I would travel from room to room, each one an adventure.” “Oh yes!” I agreed. And donned in our Saturday clothes, sale tags still hanging, we decorated the imaginary rooms with all of our very real hearts!
I think of it still. Each room an experience. Books and paintings and photos and music. Walls with feeling. A welcome. A gathering. Decorated with the sweet dreams of Sunday afternoons.
So when he said, it, it wasn’t about the bathroom itself. It was bringing my mother here. To France. It was a gathering of all sweet dreams come true.
For the same reason I offer the scent of fresh baked cookies to the kitchen painting on a Sunday afternoon. It wafts throughout the house, past Sunday night, into the fresh week’s beginning. The dream continues. Monday promises to carry.
When he saw the painting of my grandfather he asked if we still had the farm. I paused, stuck in who the “we” would even be. I started passing it down in my head, from uncle to cousin, to second cousin, (none to whom I felt a collective we). It passed again in my head to I’m not sure, to finally, it didn’t really even matter, because, I told him, “I still have everything.” And I do.
Even a lifetime and country away, I can feel the warmth of the rock at the base of the driveway. The same steady of my grandfather. The gravel beneath my feet. The jolt of an electric fence. The smell of apples, on and off the trees. The sandy feel of a cow’s tongue. The bounce of a screen door. The scent of my grandma’s kitchen. My face against her sticky apron. The ever damp basement. Jesus on the cross upstairs. Prayed to from the kitchen table. The sewing room that stitched all nine children’s lives together. The front stoop that promised the scent of tobacco and hope. My mother laughing in that kitchen. Crying in that kitchen. Hands folded at that table. Driving away from the rock one last time, never really leaving.
So, yes, I still have the farm. And the we is all who listen to the stories. The we is you who remember your own grandmother’s apron. Who read the words and climb upon your grandfather’s lap. We still have it all. We have everthing.
Something will grow from all of this, and it will be me.
Van Dyke Road separated the two worlds. It was so magical how far crossing one small stretch of gravel could take me. The back of our house faced a sea of grain — Hugo’s field. And in a way, it was like swimming, running through the stalks at full chubby- legged-speed, arms stretched to each side, creating a golden wave. Across the road though, behind Weiss’s house, was a lake. Not a big one. Nor a clean one, of the 10,000 our state touted. We didn’t swim in it. So what was the allure? It had to be the dock.
Florence and Alvin had a big yard. Bonnie, the daughter, was so much older, that to me, she was just another adult. So there were no arms of youth waving me over to play. I would sneak along the shrub line. Roll down the manicured slope to the lake’s edge. I could hear the dock before I saw it. The wave rocked wood cracking gently. I took off one bumper tennis shoe and placed my lavender-white toes on the sun warmed plank. It was extraordinary. I have no memory of being a shoeless baby, but I imagine at some point some uncle or boisterous neighbor blew their warm breath on my rounded feet, and I knew, standing there, barefoot on Weiss’s dock, this must be exactly how it felt. I giggled like that infant and took off my other shoe.
I braved each crack to the end. My body craved what my feet already had, so I lay down and let it gather in my arms, legs and back. My fingers danced at my side in the tiny puddles of cool water that gathered in the wood’s unevenness. I don’t know if I saw all the beauty of these imperfections, but I’d like to think I did.
Who knows how long I stayed. Summer afternoons felt eternal. I guess in a way, they are. I can still rest in that warmth.
I have written so many times about swimming – in actual lakes. Lake Latoka was only a bike ride away. But just out my door, front and back, oh, how my heart and imagination swam. Daily. And maybe that’s what home is after all…this ability to dream in the comfort of shore.
For me, it’s the softness of her gaze. No sharp edges to her reaction. Even her shoulders aren’t weighted. This is what makes her beautiful — not what she sees, but how she sees it. From within.
I paint her to remind myself the same is true for all of us. How we navigate through this world is what people really see. We need to stay informed, of course, but the ugliness that gathers, and there is a lot, I don’t want that inside of me. So I soften my gaze. My eyes. My lips. My tongue. Relax my shoulders. Nothing for hatred and ill will to hang on. (Because aren’t those sharp edges so much easier to cling to?)
I suppose I only know it, because I was always given that soft place to land. My grandma’s lap, my mother’s heart. I see now that it was not only for me, but for them as well. A gift we must give each other. A gift we must give ourselves. I dare the morning and the mirror softly. No sharp edges in sight.
Before I knew how to tell it. Before I owned a watch. Before Mrs. Bergstrom held up the big wooden face and moved the handles as we shouted out “before” and “after” numbers. Before all of this, there was only the sound of my mother’s voice, calling to the empty lot between Dynda’s house and ours. Where we chased the setting sun, and with only a handful of Norton girls, the lot was never in fact, empty. Bats and balls and bikes. Shoes and sweatshirts making bases. And depending on the season, flattened tracks of grass, flattened tracks of snow. Paths that only led us to believe, there would always be time.
I don’t know where I learned it. It seemed we all just knew to ask for it — five more minutes. Vowing to make the most of each. In those five minutes we would gather all the fun. All of joy of youth stuffed neatly in our pockets. We wouldn’t waste it. No. Please, please, five minutes more. After which, we would ask again. And we kept asking until the sound of all the porch mothers on Van Dyke Road lowered their voices and we knew it was, in fact, time.
Each year, I try to slow it down. The untangling of lights. The raising of ornaments. The wrapping of gifts. I read the poems slowly and sing the songs loudly. Promising with all my intention that I will indeed value each moment. I really promise. Just let it pass slowly. And in that blink, as I run all the bases of December, I can hear the voice of Christmas morning saying, “It’s time.”
“It’s full,” she said, as I squeezed the bottom of the Christmas stocking with my chubby, youthful hand. “I don’t feel anything,” I replied. “You will,” she said, “It’s packed with everything that I wish for you.” And just like that, my hands and heart were complete.
As an adult, the week before Christmas was reserved for my mother. We did everything we loved. Coffee in the morning. Shopping. Fashion shows from the bathroom mirror to the bedroom closet. Wine and stories. And laughter and tears of tenderness. Poems read and books exchanged. Sharing chocolate dark and rich — having to brush our teeth twice as we revisited the box. Giggling on pillows. Emptying slowly our stockings full of wishes that we had for the new day, the new year, for each other.
I have them throughout the house here in France. The two stockings that were my mother’s are lying on the sofa — too full of love to possibly hang.
It’s easy to get more lonesome this time of year. So many lessons learned can take away the magic. My hands can get weighted with doubt, until I shake them off, gather the stockings in, and know that all the love is still there. My hands and heart full. I am complete.
Give today a big squeeze – it’s packed with everything that I wish for you! Merry Christmas!
Walking into the entry of my grandparents’ home, I could feel my shoulders relax. Dropping down with the ease of the coats hooked on the wall. Nothing left to brace. No cold. No pretense. My first glimpse into the rumor of home.
Of course I didn’t have any of those words yet, as I danced beneath the dangling sleeves. Cuffs that smelled like tobacco and earth, brushed across my face. My mother had already made it into the kitchen. But I lingered. Stretching my unmittened hands up and into the damp sleeves. With boots still on, I could slide my feet into my grandpa’s shoes. Almost completely covered in the welcoming. Nearly finished with her first cup of egg coffee, my mother waved me in.
I suppose I’ve always been one to linger. Wanting the moment to last. It’s the 22nd and I want it all to slow down. I’m not ready to jump to the Christmas Day. I want to play the music. Loudly. Softly. I want to finger the wrapping. Nibble at the cookies. Drape myself in the entry of all the magic to come. I can see my mother’s feet in grandma’s kitchen. There’s no need to hurry. I know I am home.
