Resolution

It has been seventeen months since I wrote my last “monthly” essay, and many months before that since the habit was in fact a monthly one. Every week I have missed it. My feelings evolved from an anxiousness at having missed a month’s end deadline, to a developing fear that I would fall out of the writing habit, to a sadness at the realization that I was having less and less time to write, rather than more and more.

In these months, so much has happened. Quinn turned five and then, in another moment, turned six. She “graduated” from daycare and “jumped up” from preschool. She skied more, played more soccer, and did more gymnastics. She traveled with us to Colorado with our school, then to Wyoming to see Eloise, and to Belize to hideout—just the three of us—by the beach. We spent a long weekend in Ogunquit for Father’s Day, rented an apartment in Boston for part of a summer week to explore, and returned to our beloved Green River Reservoir twice in that time. This year, as I  started a new job, Quinn started kindergarten. As I am learning how to be me in my new role, Quinn is learning how to read. Together we cast our vote for the first female major party candidate for President of the United States. We fully believed she would win.

There have been so many trials in 2016, so many hardships hitting so close to home. And though our family has made it through this year relatively unscathed, we’ve absorbed the stresses and losses of those around us. We stood, with our community, on the Harwood soccer field, holding candles to the October sky in silence, watching paper lanterns floating away. And as I stood there, trying to imagine the loss of the five mothers whose children died, I held my own child who held her candle in silence and watched the lanterns float away. I watched her count them out, watched her understand the passing we were there to witness, and in that moment knew too much was slipping away.

School has nearly consumed me for the past two years and, while I have always been motivated and engaged in my work, I recognize this year to be different. Our school has been in crisis and I’ve been part of a team that has been actively working to hold it together each day for the past twelve months. This holiday break was the first period of more than two consecutive days in all that time that I’ve managed to disconnect from it…managed to let the emails go unanswered and let the work sit. And now that I’ve made that break, I’m having a hard time imagining going back in. In fact, I’m feeling determined not to let myself go that far back in again.

Last week we took Quinn to see The Nutcracker at the Boston Ballet. We spent a night at the Copley Plaza Hotel, ate dinner at a busy restaurant, and hurriedly did our Christmas shopping on Newbury Street amidst the city’s holiday lights. The next morning we ordered breakfast in the room and watched cartoons before heading north to celebrate Christmas with my family. It was an exhilarating twenty-four hours. And The Nutcracker was magical. I spent half the time watching the ballet, and half the time watching Quinn’s face as she watched the ballet. I have been waiting years to take her; I finally did and I enjoyed it as much as I imagined I would. Just tonight, cleaning my room, I asked Quinn if she wanted to save the program. “No,” she said, “I don’t need to. I will always remember that day.” And I will too, I hope.

The other long-imagined experience that happened with Quinn this week was skiing through our woods together. Quinn started an after school cross country ski program this year. She had only gone twice until the other day when we decided to go out together here on our hill. Sam and I have been in this house for ten years now and for all these years we’ve been walking, running and skiing the loops around us. From the time I was first pregnant, seven years ago this month, anytime I’ve been out on my skis, I have imagined skiing through these woods with Quinn. Finally it happened and it too was magical. 

Getting to this point, where she’s old enough to enjoy so many things, and capable enough to go on adventures, means she is  growing up, quite a lot. At times six seems very old, and yet there are still glimpses of the little tiny kid in her. She still says “aminal” rather than animal. And “lightling” instead of lightning. She asks me to “pass forward” through the ads on tv, rather than fast forward; I love the irony here…I would like to pass on going forward some days too.

And yet one thing that I’m realizing is that the passing of time—at least for now—is a process of life getting better and better, rather than of losing something sweet and fleeting. It is all sweet and fleeting, I know—a paper lantern lifting into a dark sky—but each day I am with Quinn I am happier to be there than I was the day before, and exponentially so compared to the early days that felt, at the time, as if they were the most important days. And to see this pattern repeated is to see light ahead rather than darkness. Her daily magic is a promise for tomorrow rather than something lost today. On my good days I am capable of dwelling in that place of gratitude and hope. 

Today I asked a friend at work to lead a yoga session to start the new year—for anyone who wanted to join. Sam and Quinn and I went together. Quinn worked hard to respect the quiet of the class for the few other people who were there. At the end, when I laid down on my back for shivasana, Quinn slid over and laid her long body on top of mine and rested her head on my chest.  For a few moments, she rose and fell on my breath. That is the breath I am determined to return to in the months ahead.