The River

     One of my favorite Christmas songs is River by Joni Mitchell (though I am partial to the Robert Downey Jr version!). It may be a stretch to really classify it as a true Christmas song, but I always come back to it at this time of year. Last year I wrote about the magic of Christmas and I feel that still. But there is also a sadness that comes with this season that River manages to capture.
      It’s nothing new to point out that everyone makes mistakes and everyone suffers some form of hardship. But knowing it doesn’t make it any easier. When it comes to the time of year when you are supposed to be looking back listing out all of the things you are grateful for, it’s hard not to come back around at all of those things you regret.
     Unfortunately there are far too many places to find examples of your own failure to live up to expectation. Parents magazine points out that I should be sculpting forest scenes out of vegetables on dinner plates to entice my children to eat better. The Millennium Running Facebook page I liked asks me if I have fit in a run today. The look on my boss’s face when I roll in to work at 9:45 after 2 solid hours of traffic reminds me that I am letting him down. And the picture my daughter draws and leaves in her backpack of a face covered in tears that says “I miss you Mom” makes me want to skip everything and hold her all day long.
     Then there are those truly personal failures as well when you don’t live up to the person you thought you were- words you shouldn’t have allowed yourself to say, choices that were clearly wrong and situations where the way to handle yourself was so obvious yet you went the other way. Everyone says it is about finding balance. If only there were a magic button, ‘cause balance ain’t so easy to come by.
     So why the pity-party? It’s not because I don’t feel that happiness of being with family, giving gifts, honoring traditions and all of the other joys that came with Christmas- I do. But because those tougher thoughts also come with The Most Wonderful Time of The Year for me in many way, and for so many other people when it’s pointed out over and over how happy we are supposed to be. So that’s it really- the contrast of expectation and reality.
     Where to go from here? I’m not sure. Taking the advice of the people who I respect (thanks guys!) would be the smartest step. They tell me the balancing act is working, things are getting done and my children are turning out pretty great. They happen to be the same people who support me the most and knowing that support comes with a huge heap of love sure doesn’t hurt. I still get that feeling that Joni Mitchell points out so well of wishing I had a river to skate away on when I am feeling like I’ve failed. But the good thing about rivers, especially frozen ones…you can always come skating back.

Not Me

Don't touch me.
Memory of some petrified day.
This armor you see,
still needs work.
Still soft to certain forces.

Don't hang your presence here.
Not where I can see it.
Not in these hollowed out halls.

Don't reach out
and make this backwards step
across all I have tried to heal from.

Don't haunt this home,
newly clean of your ghosts.
Your obstinate spirit.

Don't touch me.
It is not me.
It is not me you reach for.
Not the me your hands will know.
Not me.

Full of Breath

Stepping over their miniature clothes

pollinated with the remains

of today,

and wishing they had picked them up.

Smoothing their blankets,

casting a hand over their warm foreheads.

Sticky sweet reprimand

for skipping their baths.

 

Brushing back her clouds of hair,

tucking in his trailing arm,

laying a kiss on their moon-bright skin.

Matching their breath one by one,

folding into mine,

pools on the pillows.

Their breath

holding more consequence

then my own.

 

It’s a school night.

It’s a work day.

And the air  

is full of things I was supposed to do.

 

There is no exhaustion greater

than carrying the weight of their care.

But there is no life,

without breath.