The Haiku

Last week, my son returned home with a rather disturbing drawing, and a story to match. He is in first grade. In a mild panic, I called my sister.

“So, what do you think?” I asked.

“I think it’s disturbing. Do you remember the time Mom was called into the Guidance Office for YOU?”

Oh. Right. I had this creative writing teacher. Who, in spite the fact that she was probably well educated and well intentioned, had been transformed by my pre-teen angst into a dumb, nasty, witch.

Our assignment was to take four half-sheet cards and draw four watercolor pictures of the four seasons. For each season, we were to write a haiku.

I thought this was a colossally stupid, dumb and BO-ring idea. (Imagine me with my hands on my hips with some 12-year old scowl on my face.) Of course, I didn’t actually put my hands on my hips and make a scowl, I just decided to be obnoxiously obedient.

I decided to draw four very BO-ring (exactly the same) drawings. I would change the colors for the seasons, but that is all. I would write four very light and sappy haikus. Because, I thought the teacher’s brain was light and sappy and she would probably even LIKE it. Fine.

Winter. I drew a white landscape, a blue sky, and a small, leafless tree on the right side in the distance. I wrote a sappy haiku about a stark, lonely, and beautiful winter.

Spring. I drew a green landscape, a blue sky (with openings for white clouds), and a tree with leaves on the right side in the distance. I wrote a sappy haiku about budding leaves and the beauty of spring.

Summer. I drew a green landscape (with a little brown), a blue sky without clouds, and a tree with leaves on the right side in the distance. I wrote a sappy haiku about a happy summertime.

Fall. At this point, I had no interest in spending time drawing different color leaves. I drew a dark purple landscape with an orange-yellow sky. I drew a leafless tree on the right side in the distance. I decided it was late Fall. Fine. Done.

As I was touching up the landscape, a big blob of dark paint fell from my brush onto my beautiful orange sky. In a panic, I quickly picked up the card, and watched the big gray blob of paint drip down to meet my landscape.

After staring a hole into the “ruined” card, I realized that my big gray blob did add something to my picture, and I wrote the following haiku, which I remember to this day:

Nuclear mushrooms, Blooming on the Autumn plain, Take claim on the world.

Ha! Done! I turned in my pictures with Autumn at the bottom.

And, within a few days, my mother received a call from the school wondering why her daughter so cheerfully predicted the end of the world . . . .

My son’s picture remains on our refrigerator.

And, on the right side in the distance, I hear my mother’s laughter.

Warm Cookies

“Mom, can we make cookies?”

Those hazel eyes looked up at me lovingly last week, one hand pushing back her curls. I was about to put George down for a nap. Andrew was at school.

“Can we Mom?”

By some accidental spark of genius, or perhaps good intentioned folly, the unwritten rule in our house is that the only cookies we have are ones that we make. I have never stated this rule to the kids. It just became a fact. They don’t ask for cookies in the supermarket. If I bought them, they would ask me what they were for.

Unfortunately, stay at home mom or not, I do not always feel like baking cookies. But, once we get started, I love to see them peering into the stand mixer. I love to see the anticipation in their eyes when I pull off the beater and let them lick it. I even love it when my daughter turns the stand mixer on way too high (even after she said she wouldn’t) and flour poufs everywhere. By the end, I manage to forget about the floor and am asking Gladys to try a chocolate chip before we pour them in the bowl, just to make sure they taste right. I had used the same recipe as my mother, the one out of that blue McCall’s cookbook from the 60’s. You know, the one that has those fabulous now vintage pictures and the hints on how to set a proper breakfast table for your husband on a weekday morning.

We made cookies.

The first batch came out of the oven just as it was time to go to the bus stop to greet Andrew.

“Shoes on, Honey. Grab your jacket. Time to get Andrew.”

“Let’s run, Mommy!”

Gladys loves to run. We hold hands. We run to the bus stop.

Andrew jumped off the bus stop happy as could be. He had a great day at school. He jumped into my arms, all 50+ pounds of my six year old. Gladys wanted to join in, so I picked her up too, holding on to Andrew’s back; these are Mommy muscles.

The three of us held hands and ran all the way home through the crisp fall air. My lungs felt clean.

Gladys announced our surprise before we made it to the door, but no words could be as powerful as the smell of warm cookies.

All of the sudden, I had gotten off the bus myself, like so many years ago.

First Day First Grade

Today was Andrew’s first day of full day school. He’s in first grade. He’s such a big boy and such a little boy all at the same time. Sigh. Okay. That’s quite enough of that.

I’ll give you one snapshot of my day.

When a woman in the PTA stopped by to pick up some materials for the meeting tonight, the following things were going on in my house: George was sleeping, Gladys was stopping around in dress-up clothes with cookie-dough hands, cookies were baking, vegetables were in my braising pot ready to burn, mail was falling off the island, ribbons and card stock were on the floor from a just-done project, laundry was piled on the couch, the dryer was beeping with more, ingredients were everywhere, bags from Target were still on the floor, extra school supplies were in the front hall, my phone was out of batteries, a sandy baby blanket was still on my porch, sixteen pairs of shoes were by the door, crayons were under the table, and my son’s bus was returning from school in less than five minutes.

I don’t really know her all that well.

I forgot to find one of the sheets she needed.

When I ran upstairs to print a new one, she stirred my vegetables.

I gave her the sheet. I put shoes on the feet for which I’m responsible (there were plenty of shoes to choose from). I turned off the braising vegetables, and ran out the door with my camera, just in time to get a HUGE hug from my son running off the bus.

Andrew was greeted with a very special cookie made by his sister.

We said prayers before dinner and ate a braised whole chicken in wine and herbs, on a clean table and over a (hastily) swept-clean floor.

I am pretty sure that is not how I expected Andrew’s first day of school to look on the day he was born.

I am glad I finally have things in perspective.

The wheels on the bus swirl in my head

Less than two weeks before school starts: thirteen days and counting. For six years, yes, since my first was born, I have looked forward to sending them to school. I know for those first six months of his life I would have given my eyeteeth to just send him to school for one day. Please, please, just get me through the day I would think. Where did this child come from? Okay, I knew that part, but what craziness entrusted me with a child? I desperately wanted children. We had fertility issues, we tried “forever”, but those first sixth months were mind-boggling. I thought they would never end.

I was SO tired. I had only one friend in the new town (who is, remarkably, still my friend). I was SO alone with the child. I craved human interaction that didn’t involve having a human attached to me. I had lost myself a little. I missed me. Where was I in all of this mess?

My old self is still there, she is my friend, but she isn’t me. I love her, I think of her often, I even wonder what she would think if she could see me now. That woman had her heart all in one place. She made plans and moved forward, undaunted. Confident in a way that you can be when your heart is all yours.

I agreed to share my heart when I married. I cried about that. I knew that my decisions were still mine, but they were also ours. I became tangled up. It is a happy tangle. Then we had a baby. I thought postpartum was that short time right after birth. I didn’t realize that my heart would be running around in someone else’s body too. Then we had two more babies. Now my heart can run in five directions at once. It can be broken and filled with joy within the same moment. I’m so blessed. I can barely breathe.

School starts in 13 days. I am not ready. We have school supplies. My husband wants to take him clothes shopping. He has a lunchbox. My son is ready. He’s so ready. I am proud of him. I want him to go to school. I want to see his broad smile getting on that bus. I want to see the confidence he has running back down the street, asking if I made cookies today, just for a special surprise. I am even ready for the days when he is teased on the bus, when he is disappointed by the day. My heart is ready. His heart will grow stronger and so will mine. His heart will grow prouder and so will mine. My two little ones will be home; they will blossom with extra attention.

Please, can’t I just have a few more days?