Ahoy

At the 3am wake-up call, I crawled into Bug's bed and let him nestle into a big bowl of mommy. The chilly October air made the closeness a particular comfort. Bug promptly crashed. Warmth is apparently fear's kryptonite. I let myself drift, but a cackle from my son startled me to alertness. In his sleep, Bug was snickering. The sound roused him, too, and he pushed closer to me, grinning. "I had a dream, Mommy." He began to tell it just as the words turned to cake batter in his mouth. He was back under. A few minutes later, another dose of his giggles jolted me awake.

I can't know how the anxiety of splitting a life between two homes might be affecting my son. It isn't fair to him, is it? Tee and I know we can't live together, yet I still fantasize about biting the bullet and making a go of it. One bed for Bug? A single set of books, of boots, of parents, of expectations? Why should this little boy carry the bulk of the discomfort? That's a pretty big shot of adaptation to demand of a kid.

Nevertheless, the ship has left port. On the phone prior to the meeting, the lawyer was prepared to take Tee to the mat. "Bring in his 401K records, his pay stubs, your joint tax documents. You may be entitled to child support, and you are entitled to half the marital assets."

I ignored her. The only papers I brought were ones Tee and I created and reviewed together: Separation Agreement, 26-point Parenting Plan, Virginia divorce paperwork. No subterfuge, no secret strategies. She combed through the pages to make sure Bug is protected, Tee and I have a plan for every contingency, and everything is polished up for the judge to stamp it legal.

At the end of the consultation, the lawyer looked up at me and smiled. "You guys really did all this yourselves?" I nodded, trying not to let the wave of relief and pride upend me. "You two have done an excellent job on this. You've covered everything and more." She cut the retainer in half and told me we should be able to move through the remaining steps without a hitch. If Bug never knows how much effort it has taken to keep this vessel steady on relentlessly churning seas, then we can claim victory.

We sail on in this way, the rigging tight in our grasp. Tee and I have been planning Bug's pirate-themed birthday party for over two months. Never once did it occur to me to do this alone, or to leave the organizing to the parent whose weekend is shared with Bug. Half the task list fell to each of us according to our strengths and preferences. A friend is on the payroll, making a treasure chest out of cake. Bug's Grandma and I have assembled the food and helium balloons and favors decorated with skulls. Tee is managing a treasure hunt and limbo, invitations and thank you notes. Occasional check-ins at allow us to make sure details and numbers are in sync. Beyond that, we trust each other to take care of business. We are a professional partnership now.

In four hours, 35 members of Bug’s growing circle will turn the park where Tee and I were married into a Caribbean island peppered with hidden riches. My objective is to have our son never know that his two parents could have behaved in ways that would have made this impossible. Normal = cooperation. Tortuga may be today’s destination, but civility is our true north.

None of us knows how much our children will have to pay for our choices. This question has kept me awake at night for well over a year. All too often, when sleep does come, tsunamis and rising tides have me racing for a shrinking scrap of safe ground. This is why I am grateful when I startle awake and discover the culprit to be Bug’s mirth.

Five

On a winding trail through the San Gabriels, we scaled the frosted mountainside together. You clung with embryonic persistence as my toes found purchase in snowbanks peeling back from crumbling stone. It was February then, or maybe March, and you were still just a hope I dared not count as one among us. Still, we wound our thread together through those unmarked canyons, managing to find our way both in and back out despite our shared inability to identify a true north. When gravity pushed back against my smug confidence, she kicked my heel out from under me and tumbled me down a frozen waterfall, my backside raking over the jagged teeth of the unyielding creek below. My skin gasped through torn trousers at the slap of iced air and my coccyx howled in protest. But not you. You just rolled on over and commanded me, "Up, Mommy! Do it again!"

We walked through the spring months over eroding summits, through ponderosa and coulter pine forests. We disentangled ourselves from the manzanita's ruby clutches and breathed deep the clouds of sandstone dust. Rattlesnakes coiled at the trail's edge. Coyotes lurked in packs down below, lapping at whatever ribbon of creek remained as the bottomless thirst of June and then July pressed in. You grew hot and restless, as keen to hear the insane yelps of those wild dogs as any among us. You were not yet a name, but you were a definite you.

Every one of those sweltering August days, California's high desert sky was an uninterrupted expanse of blue. Where shade was insufficient, we took shelter in water. The camp pool was our sanctuary during the noon lunch hour. In the dining hall nearby, squeals of damp, red-faced children eating corn dogs and tater tots tumbled down over us as we cut through the rectangle of blue. Immersion, extension, buoyancy, breath.

We climbed and swam together until the doctor demanded we stop. We stretched ourselves out through September, cutting a trench in the camp perimeter with our shared weight, with our endless steps. Two weeks before your ETA, the doc announced you were on your way. You had sent me no signal; you had never even knocked. You just began shouldering open the stable door, compelled, perhaps, by the bright promise on this side of the threshold.

In that hospital in Apple Valley, though, you stalled right at the starting gate. One never knows what kind of kid is going to come slipping out to life. Maybe you were to be a hesitant type after all. Would you be one who lingers in doorways? One who keeps his feet planted firm on flat ground while the others bound up and over the uncertain horizon?

The doctor told me to walk. I walked. The tiny hospital courtyard became a stadium track, a mountain pass, the whole of the Pacific Rim trail. For nine months, we had marched. Now we walked another 90 years, another 900 miles, a marathon to coax you to life.

When the doc finally forced you free and you landed in your daddy's waiting hands, we knew it was not reluctance that had held you back. Arm up, fist raised, you had been trying to punch your way right through to the light of day. My boy has been a warrior from the start. You defy rules. You blaze your own trail. This, even when your stubbornness hamstrings your own determination to be the first across the finish line. You came over to our side fully formed, a tiny hot-wired motor already primed for speed.

"Alive 'til five," the grandmothers say. This alone is a lofty goal for the mama of a boy like you. It stuns me you have survived, let alone thrived. Yet here you are, launching yourself around the next lap. Your pace is not faltering, and your stride only grows more sure.

Happy birthday, baby. The terrain ahead may be rough, but I look forward to crossing every inch of it with you.

Disoriented

I never know which grandmother will greet me at the door. Will she be the wounded one with the hair trigger? Or will I have to coax from the bed a woman who coughs, sleeps, and apologizes her way through the day?

This week, I was delighted to become re-acquainted with an old friend. A smiling, good-natured lady was waiting in the breakfast nook for our arrival. She bore a close resemblance to the grandmother I remember from my childhood.

Dementia is disorienting for everyone involved. I had not realized how tense I was about the trip to Dallas with Bug until about halfway through the second day. It took me this long to notice my grandmother had not lost her temper with my son or me. Sure, she asked a dozen times if I had the garage door opener. For this visit, she had latched onto a recollection of arguing with a neighbor boy about the driveway of her childhood home. Each telling, the first telling. But through all this, she was still smiling and bobbing along the surface of whatever familial chaos unfolded around her. I felt my shoulders relax. Maybe she would, in fact, make it through our visit without morphing again into one of those other women who inhabit her skin.

My grandmother turned 91 on July 5^th. She is living most of the time in her own house. With assorted relatives and hired hands cycling through to refresh the contents of the fridge and ferry her to doctor’s appointments, she is managing much better than anyone expected. Despite the fact that the calendar has become nothing more than wall art, she can still remember which grandkid and great-grandkid belongs where and to whom. She kvetches over the Dallas Morning News every day, feeds the birds in her overgrown back yard, and occasionally remembers to eat.

 

We had a 4^th-of-July barbecue and birthday party with family up the road. Bug chose a singing card. He danced around the house to “I like to move it, move it,” shaking his booty as laughter rained down. Another grown grandson helped with the grill. We ate burgers and let the lady reminisce. Bug reversed the order of the candles. Grandma turned 19.

The next afternoon, I deposited Bug with a generous aunt for a date with my grandmother.  She doesn’t have the stamina for much these days, but she can still rally for a ladies’ lunch at Neiman Marcus.

I would rather eat beef jerky from the Mobil Short Stop than lunch at a store filled with things I can’t afford and will never have occasion to wear. Strolling through Neiman’s, however, is the old girl’s giddy pleasure. “Oh, isn’t this just lovely!” Grandma cooed and oohed over the Louis Vuitton display, touching the buttery leather. The sophisticated gleam of the store widened her eyes and her grin. My gut contracted with envy as I watched trim man in a suit indulge his blond companion in a search for the perfect Prada bag. My grandmother noticed only the exquisite order of the jewelry counter.

I cannot understand this kind of appreciation for the unattainable. A woman who spends most days decked out in a bathrobe was lingering over a $2000 Roberto Cavalli sheath designed for someone with the figure of a prepubescent boy. While she stroked the hummingbird printed into the aquatic blue fabric, I squirmed in my consignment store sun dress and DSW sandals. Next to Lalique wine glasses, turtle-shaped salt-and-pepper shakers encrusted with rhinestones, and distressed outdoor furniture, my grandmother chatted up employees and gushed in wonder at the beauty of it all. “Do you believe it? Here I am, 91 years old,” she told the salesgirl over a mirrored display of crystal bud vases. “My granddaughter came all the way here just to take me out to lunch.”

“You have a lot to be thankful for,” the salesgirl grinned.

“Oh, you don’t have to tell me,” she said, resting her thin hand on my shoulder.

My grandmother counterbalanced every ounce of my covetousness with an equal measure of joy.

We made our way up to the third floor café where we sipped tiny cups of warm broth and broke open steaming popovers. The servers and manager dipped and fled, quick as dragonflies. They refilled our glasses, delivered dishes of radiant salad greens, and swept the crumbs from the table. They made sure the birthday girl knew her mere presence was a gift.

Swallowing gets harder as you age. Appetite keeps pace with the metabolism of the sedentary. It took my grandmother nearly an hour and a half to work through a third of her Cobb salad. She talked instead. “Those neighbors called in county engineers to build that cussed driveway,” she said. “They weren’t road builders. What a mess it was.” We were back in 1928, sitting on the curb with the neighbor boy, arguing over whose side of the yard belonged to whom. Somehow, this woman plodded her way through the 20^th century, stumbled along the front end of the 21^st, and landed in a big old house in the Dallas suburbs with a military pension and enough love to carry her through to the end.

A raspberry-studded meringue drizzled in caramel and cream lit on our table, candle dancing. My grandmother made her wish, keeping that one secret to herself. Then she clapped her hands dug in, rolling her eyes in ecstasy.

“This time next year,” she said, gesturing with her fork. “Right here.”

We all fret about her. We all worry and tsk-tsk about how sad it all is. But I sat right there and watched an ancient lady make a wish for her 92^nd year. How many of us will have the luxury of drifting through the last chapter of our lives, buoyed by a craft comprised of such care? I don’t know about sad. Try rare and wondrous.

Finding any of my grandmothers waiting in that breakfast nook in a year’s time would be a blessing. It wouldn’t matter in the least which one is there. You don’t need age and Alzheimer’s to help you forget certain things. Just turn your attention away from the silly distractions and gaze in dumb wonder at what is right in front of you. Indeed, dementia disorients. A new orientation may not be such a bad thing after all.

“Right here,” I said, leaning across the table to scoop up some sweetness. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”