Before I knew how to spell either, the word nest was synonymous with the word comfort. I built one for my baby dolls and stuffed animals right beside my twin bed —sheeted with Raggedy Ann and Andy, topped with Big Susie, the largest of my stuffed dolls, who watched over them all when I went to Kindergarten at Washington Elementary. And when I needed a nest of my own, when spelling, or sharing, or the afternoon milk break became too much to handle, I would borrow the blankets (with their permission of course) and build a nest beside my mother’s bed, and she would Big Susie me through the night, and I was saved.
It’s no secret that I love to paint birds. This year, for the first time, I started giving them nests. So perhaps it’s no surprise that this is when it appeared, the giant nest at the edge of the forest. I’ve already built one panel with the wood, and it continues to support me daily. Between step and worry, it always makes me smile as I pass. This could out-Susie any problem that I had. And so I leave it at the nest.
And isn’t that what we all have to do in order to fly? I empty my cares, and walk a little lighter. This may be the day, this could be the day, the day that I fly!
Long before I even knew how to read, I knew how to comfort myself. It started with off-brand crayons and coloring books from the bottom shelf at Olson’s Super Market. I can’t be certain I even knew what the feelings were. If I even had a word for comfort. But I did know this, after completing a page, presenting it to my mother, I was held in the warmth of her embrace, and I was saved. It’s still true today.
It wasn’t until I moved to France that I started painting birds. And true to my own algorithm, I suppose, it was then I was introduced to the book “Bird by bird,” by Anne Lamott. It was her father’s incite that gave the book its title:
“Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. It was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, ‘Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.’”
Reading it so many years after practicing it, seems to me to be but a wink from heaven.
I made a short video after completing the page of birds. The first suggested song was “Wonderland.” It sings the question, “How do you get to Wonderland?” I smile, because I learned the answer so long ago —bird by bird.
There was nothing really “western” about it, this growing up in the Midwest. Maybe that’s why I remember them — the bookends my mother had — wooden cowboys riding wildly on horseback, not taming, but protecting each author in our living room on Van Dyke Road.
And surely it was my mother’s love for the written word and her wooden bookends that led me to the “Cowboy Sam” series on the bottom first and second grade shelves of the Washington Elementary library. We read together each night, a trail I won’t forget.
When the years roughened the edges of the metal bottoms that slid under the books, she lined them with green felt, and the words rode in comfort once again. She taught me that each story was precious, to be held, cared for — even hers, even mine.
I never would have imagined then that some of the plots we lived through could be gathered, softened… even protected. But she, you see, was and is the green felt that slides the cowboy ‘neath the wildest of my words, my dreams and keeps them alive.
I left my winter coat in Minnesota. It’s tucked into the back of my friend’s closet. I used to leave it with my mom. I don’t really need it in France, but that wasn’t the only reason. It was more of a promise that I would come back. And even more, that part of me was still there.
It’s silly, I suppose, it’s just a thing. But it is a symbol of something much bigger. Because isn’t that what love is? This giving of a part of you. This leaving a bit of yourself with another. Trusting it is in good hands. In good heart.
I had a conversation yesterday with a new friend. We spoke of vulnerability, why people are so afraid to share anything, even a simple comment. She said that some of her friends worry that it isn’t safe. If you’re looking for guarantees, here’s one for you — straight from Ernest Hemingway — “If two people love each other there can be no happy end to it.” That is about as certain as you can get. But knowing it, you no longer have to worry about it. So go ahead and love. Leave it all behind. Your courage. Your coat. Your heart. In every place that you visit. In everything you touch. In everyone you touch.
I find great pleasure in the fact that on any given day, if she needed to, she could wrap herself in my coat, in my friendship, in a bit of my heart.
Maybe it’s a chance I take, daily, this sharing. This reaching out. Wanting to connect. To be a part of something bigger than myself. I know this for sure — my closet is full, and my heart keeps making space.
It was only an hour each weekday. After school. I’d get off the bus at around 3:30pm and wait. Two picture windows faced our driveway. Some days, I could be distracted by The Brady Bunch, but the majority of those 60 minutes before my mom came home from work was spent waiting against those windows.
They taught us at Washington Elementary not to touch the glass windows that lined our classroom, because it was the janitor who would have to clean the windows dailly. And we didn’t want to make his job harder, did we? But seeing how it was my job to clean the windows at home each Thursday afternoon with newspaper and Windex, I wasn’t that concerned. I fogged the glass with my breath. Drew smiley faces. Smeared them away. Blew again. Then sad faces. Erased and blew. Challenged myself to tic-tac-toe. Continuously smearing cheek and fingers across the glass. Waiting. And waiting.
The gravel road always gave sufficient warning. The sound of the tires popping at 4:37pm would tell me that my mom was about to arrive. I’d hoist my top above my waist and wipe the window. Race to the garage entry. Fling the door. And I was saved.
She never mentioned it — the streaked glass. But of course she must have known. It wasn’t like my t-shirt wipe gave a proper cleaning. But that’s who she was — the person who allowed me to be me. Never made fun of my silly antics. She saw me. And loved me.
I smiled each Thursday afternoon as I took last week’s Echo and wiped it across the pane. It sparkled clean along with my heart. A fresh start. All waiting’s worries were washed away.
I see it now. So clearly. I thought she was saving me, daily, and she did, but even more importantly, she gave me the ability to save myself. A gift I continue to use. I smile out my morning window, and I am saved.
When I told her I was never going back to school, I meant it. It was in the first week of my first grade at Washington Elementary and the first time I had ever been called a bad name. It being my first time, I didn’t remember the name, but I remembered the venom that spewed from Steve Brolin’s mouth and landed directly on my heart of firsts.
Of course it happened the first thing that morning on the playground, so I had to hold it in all day. By the time my feet jumped from the last step of the bus, the tears began to flow. Big, bulbous bubbles that caught for several seconds in my eyelashes. Tears that puddled in the fold of my new dress as I sat on the cement floor of the garage, willing my mom to come home early from work and receive the news.
She knew something was wrong immediately, seeing me sprawled on the cement, with my backpack laying atop the garbage can. “I’m never going back,” I said. “Ok,” she said calmly. She didn’t argue with me. Just took my hand. Washed my face. Kissed my eyelashes.
It being autumn, the nights had just begun to get cooler. “Would you like to put on your winter pajamas?” she asked. The feel of the soft plaid down my arms. Down my legs. Wrapped early for Christmas, she tucked me under the crisp white sheet. “I don’t think I want my books in the garbage anymore.” “I’ll get them,” she said. “But just for me,” I said, “I’m not going back.” “OK,” she said.
I could hear her getting ready for work. Smell the coffee. My chubby feet wiggled beneath the plaid and hit the carpet. I brushed my teeth. My hair. My brown sack lunch was ready at the end of the table, right beside my backpack – it along with my heart – rescued. I guess we both knew I was going back. “I don’t like Steve Brolin,” I said. “That’s OK. Do you remember what he said,” she asked me for the first time. “Not really,” I said. “Do you remember I love you?” she smiled. “Yes!” I smiled. She got in her car and waved to me as I stood by the mailboxes waiting for the bus. It was the first time I got over something. It wouldn’t be the last. My mother showed me how to love my way through. I walk by her photo and wave, smiling, and knowing, everything is OK.
It’s not lost on me that it was orange. When she handed it to me at the pharmacy — this promotional bag, a gift with purchase, I think my whole body sighed. It wasn’t the first time an orange bag came to my rescue.
It had been a stressful morning. To give it more time is not useful. We were dealing with visa paperwork and government employees. The stress of it all seemed too much for my heart to carry. When leaving the building, we knew we had to do something quickly to change our minds. The most obvious, and most French thing to do, was to head to the pharmacy. I needed some lip balm. I added a couple of items, but my entire purchase fit in the palm of my hand. Two tubes of lip balm and dental floss. Out of nowhere, (or straight from my mother’s hands) the clerk behind the counter put my tiny purchase in the largest orange cloth bag. It was beautiful. And the pure randomness, some might say unnecessary-ness of it all, felt in this moment, so glorious, and completely, well, necessary.
I was 5 years old the first time I had to go to the hospital. Naturally, I was terrified. It was not only my first time in a hospital, but the first night that I would spend away from my mother. I loved books. I loved words. I loved when my mother read to me. When she let me read to her. The only book I knew by heart was “The Little China Pig.” We had read it so many times together. Each night, despite the dark, and all things scary that could occur, I was safe within the words. My mother knew this. Before leaving for the hospital that morning, my eyes packed with tears, my hands clutching the words of this little pig, my mom gave me the most glorious gift. A hand made orange book bag. It was ridiculously too large for my one book, but she knew it also had to carry the weight of my heart. And so I filled it, with book and needless worry, and I was saved.
Lips balmed, heart unburdened in a bright orange sack, (surely touched once again by the hand of my mother) I begin this beautiful new day! Fully prepared to do the unnecessary!
I’m not sure that it was the heart of the lesson, but what I learned with the math “times tables” in first grade (this times this equals this) was that if you memorized something, it came with the security of always having it. I suppose this was the security I was searching for.
It was just my mom and I. Everyone else had left. I could hear my mother cry at night. I wrote poems and drew pictures, hoping to give the tears a soft place to land. But in the dark of night, I, we, could see none of them. So I began to sing, in my head. I found an old album cover that my sister used to play. It was Joni Mitchell’s, Court and Spark. I memorized the songs. Each lyric. Each note. I knew them all. Each took around three minutes to sing. And magically, time would pass. “This times this” — words times music equaled safety.
When days and nights became easier. Time became filled with activities and eventually, somehow, joy. I heard my mother’s laugh. And my own. Life became more full. And the rotations of songs in my head, became less frequent. And then almost not at all. But I knew they were there. They still are. And now, if I sing one, maybe while mowing the lawn, it is somehow, nothing but joy.
I painted her on one of my jean jackets. Maybe it’s too simple to say that she had my back. It may be simple, but it is true.
I saw a video of her on Youtube yesterday. 78, having survived a near death experience not that long ago. The words came out like honey. Pure and sweet. Tears flowed out of the eyes of those around her. Cheers flowed out of the audience. It was beautiful! Magical. Nothing but joy. And at the end of the song, she laughed. Giggled really. Like the little girl that still lived within her. Like all the little girls, the women, she carried. And in that moment, (with the words and music that we will always have,) she, I, we, were saved.
I have professed my love for libraries, over and over. The Washington School Library. The Alexandria Public Library. One small room. One small building. Each opened a world to me that will never close. I can smell the wood that housed the paper. The slight hint of sweet mildew, like an open window.
The truth is, this was not my first impression of books. My first collection of words on pages — words mixed with colorful art – these books held the smell of fresh produce. It was at Olson’s Supermarket. My mother hoisted me into the shopping cart. The silver denting the back of my thighs. Legs dangling. Her purse beside me.
Just after the cart corral was a long display of Golden Books. I can feel my arms reaching. They were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. She placed one in my chubby hand and I was changed. Words on paper. My arms will be forever reaching.
I can hear her voice reading each page. Night after night. Year after year. And then I started to hear my own. How do you thank someone for giving you the world? I suppose the only way I know is to use the same words I was given. Again and again.
I was speaking to the young woman who is currently working on my new website. Not a small task. She has to handle each piece of art, each word. She told me yesterday, because she is so immersed in all of the work, “I feel like I know you.” My heart is still smiling. My arms are still reaching. We are in different countries. From different generations, and my paintings of the apples remind her of her mother’s kitchen. Once again, the sweet smell of produce… My world opens, and I give thanks with the words that first saved me.
The Little China Pig — it is my first memory of a book. I was six years old. In the hospital in St. Cloud. They wouldn’t let my mom stay overnight with me. I was terrified. She gave me this book. (Books, forever to be my grace and pacifier.). I clung to each page. The story was about a little China Pig in a store who so wanted to be taken home. So wanted to be loved. Cared for. Taken home. I guess we all want that. Even the little girl in the hospital bed next to mine. Crying. I
cheerleaded each word over to her bed. And we were saved. Yesterday I went into Cherry Street Books. I asked Lee for a certain title that I wanted to give for a gift. She walked me over to the section, and there it was, right next to all of my books — books that I have written, illustrated, placed right there, on the shelf. My cheerleading heart threw its hands in the air — I was home. Always saved.
I guess I have always lived in the word. What a glorious world! May it never be lost on me. May my heart forever be joyful, writing, sharing…home.
