Perspective

An offering for our friends Jerry & Rebecca, and for Henry. Wishing all of them happiness they can feel in their bones.

A Brief One-Act Play 

The couple enters stage left to a dimly lit kitchen. Red lights hang over the island where the woman sets out placemats and napkins for dinner. The man stirs something in a sauté pan on the stovetop. Background music is audible from stage left. A fire is in the woodstove.

Sam: "Sounds like Jerry and Rebecca's birth was very civilized. Almost as civilized as ours. More civilized than ours actually…no one had to get up at 3am."

Kerry: "You didn't get up at 3 am."

Sam: "I didn't say that I got up at 3am."

Kerry: "You didn't even get up at 4 am."

Sam: "I got up at 5 am."

Kerry: "No you got up at 5:30 am when I woke you up. Again."

Sam: "Well, I had to drive…"

Perspective is everything really, isn't it? It is our version of what is real, what is happening, or what is not happening. It is a thing we sometimes lose in the chaos of days, and without it the world around us goes all askew. But regain that vision, that ability to see proper proportion, proper distance, things lining up as they are meant to, and the heart expands again. The lungs fill. The smile comes.

One night, maybe two weeks ago, Sam came to where I was sitting at the dining room table. He knelt down next to me and looked at me in the way he does when he has something intimate to say. "Lately I've been feeling really happy," he said, his eyes lit up with the sincerity of it. Ever the wise guy, I congratulated him. "Welcome to your forties buddy; it's about time." (When Sam is lit up like that, I can say anything and he remains largely undeterred). "I feel happy, in a rational way, a lot of the time, but this is different," he said, "I feel it in my bones."

I feel that way often, for at least some small part of most days, and so I was glad to hear his news. I've come to understand that Sam feels things deeply, but he rarely expresses those deepest feelings in words—one of the many ways we are different. For this reason, his pronouncement was a gift that I received with gratitude. He could have easily felt the happiness in his bones and kept on with his business, and I never would have known what he was experiencing.

It turns out we are both experiencing this kind of grateful pause fairly often these days. The perspective we have feels very fresh...very new.

One day, maybe two weeks ago, my boss and I were sitting in two Adirondack chairs on the side of our school's soccer field in front of the library. While we talked we were looking at the ridge of mountains that defines the campus view, lit up by midday sun on foliage. "I know the leaves are beautiful every year," I said, "but this year they seem more beautiful." I felt like that might have been a stupid thing to say, but that's what I was thinking. "And you know," he replied, "they actually keep getting more beautiful every single year."

I know what he's talking about. Every little thing really does seem to get more beautiful, every single year. I can't deny it, even in my most dour or skeptical moments.

One day, about a week ago, I came home from school ahead of Sam. I was fighting off a cold and felt like hell. Somehow I managed to force myself to get my sneakers on and get the dogs out for a walk…I'm not usually good at rallying like that when I don’t feel well, but for some reason I did. I wanted to bring my ipod so I could listen to some music, have some company along, but it wasn't working. I went without it.

When the dogs and I reached the upper part of the loop, and my eyes were on the uneven footing of the trail, I noticed fresh moose tracks in the mud and started feeling happy. We see tracks often, and every time I feel grateful to live in a place also inhabited by such wild life. Lost in this feeling of Thoreauvian good fortune, I hadn't noticed that the dogs were stopped ahead of me. It was only when I heard a deep groan that I looked up.

There were two moose on the trail just ahead of us. The cow and Moses stared each other down, my dog with  his fur in a full mohawk from head to tail. The bull was oblivious, munching away on the few remaining green leaves. I've seen many moose, but none so close as these, or for such a prolonged look. They were humongous and, as I stood there motionless, I started wondering, is this mating season?

Before I could remember, Moses broke the silence with a bark and the bull lifted his tremendous head, with its gigantic rack of antlers, and he turned to look directly at all three of us. It was then I started thinking I should perhaps get myself behind a tree. Both moose together took a few quick steps in our direction before making a fast left off the trail and down into the woods.

The dogs and I stood still, waiting for a minute, listening to them crunch their way through the understory before we continued on our walk. It is mating season, of course. Hunting season as well. How strange that the two are together…the risk of death always intertwined with the great raw power of life.

I smiled all the way home…my home on this hill shared by moose and bears and coyotes and owls. I thought of Quinn—eager for her to see her first wild creatures, eager to know what perspective they will offer to her, if any. I hope they do; it's hard to imagine they won't…

Yesterday was Sam's day to do something on his own. I was with Quinn who happened to be in a terrible mood—still congested and overly tired from her busy week. The weather worked in his favor for once: the rivers came up on a day he could get out, and the sun shone hot all day. A friend was free and he was able to go paddling…the stars very rarely align for him in this way and when he came home in the afternoon, just as Quinn was waking up from her nap, his joy was palpable.  "Daddy's home!" she yelled as he walked through the door, and she leaned out to be pulled into his arms.

We raked leaves before giving Quinn a bath. She ate dinner, read books and drank warm milk with maple syrup before going effortlessly back to sleep at seven o'clock. The house was clean, the dogs were bathed and walked and quiet, the music was on. Red potatoes were boiling on the stove, and I sat in a comfortable chair with a glass of red wine and a new New Yorker on my lap. Sam went out the back door to put a steak on the grill, and I started to cry...sometimes I feel so grateful I don't know what else to do.

I tried to explain it to him when we were eventually eating dinner. "That's funny," he said, "because when I went outside I sat in the chair on the deck for a minute looking at the stars, and I was trying to figure out how to express my gratitude to…I don't know, the universe."

How do we express our gratitude in this life? 

We never really came up with an answer and even now all I can think to do is write it down. Sometimes, when you feel it in your bones, happiness and gratitude seem beyond the scope of words.

The Nature Of It

Autumn marks my annual rendezvous with Ralph Waldo Emerson. I cannot seem to quit him.

"Every hour and season yields its tribute of delight; for every hour and change corresponds to and authorizes a different state of the mind, from breathless noon to grimmest midnight… Nature is not always tricked in holiday attire, but the same scene which yesterday breathed perfume and glittered as for the frolic of the nymphs, is overspread with melancholy today. Nature always wears the colors of the spirit."

As cyclical as the seasons are the routines of relationship—at least my relationship with Sam, for better and for worse.

Sometimes we get caught circling in the eddies, whirlpools of frustration formed by seen and unseen obstacles. We circle around, easily agitated, never quite relaxed, or rested, or satisfied. After the highs of this life, the lows seem devastating. When we manage to catch up, to connect, get the laundry washed and put away, the dog hair vacuumed and removed, the counters cleared of debris, get outside together, share some laughter, some affection, some moments of color and joy…our little world seems illuminated. 

Then, after a day or two, or a week or two, of basking in that light, somehow the darkness returns—the papers pile up at school, the clothes pile up in the same place on the bedroom floor, the toothbrush, somehow unable to make it to the cabinet, lies pathetically on the edge of the sink, the recycling bin overflows, the shower head drips again, the toys sleep where they've been left, on countertops and on carpets underfoot, the mice return, to the kitchen and car, we eat frozen pizzas for dinner and go to bed, exhausted. In those cycles, we are sitting on swirling water, stunned to inaction, waiting passively (Sam) or impatiently (me) for the current to spit us out.

Always it does. But still, when we're returned to the moving water, we somehow forget to anticipate the next funky current; we forget to be on guard and fail to anticipate the pattern—the only way possible to break it.

Someday, maybe we will. Or maybe we never will.  I wish I knew. Nothing is perfect...but what is close enough? How do you know what to hope for, and what to accept? 

Nothing is perfect, but I suppose perspective is half the battle. Sometimes the sky can look very dark, and then, when you adjust your focus, on the same scene, the color returns.

"In the woods, we return to reason and faith."

And then, if we're lucky, we return home.

 

Quinn Turns Two

Before breakfast, on Quinn's second birthday, I wanted to get her foot prints and hand prints with paint, to add to those I have from the day she was born, and from last year's efforts captured in pink. This year, I poured some yellow latex paint into a shallow plastic bin and then lifted her into it, with her bare feet. Immediately she started to cry. I poured way too much paint, so despite the wrestling and pleading that ensued, I got no prints—just big yellow blobs on paper, and big yellow blobs on clothes and in hair, ours and hers. By the time we were done, all three of us were covered in yellow.

I also wanted to put a mark on the post in the basement, to show how tall she was on her second birthday, but this too made her cry. Sam tried his best to convince her it was a painless process, standing with your back to the post; we pretended to mark each other's height over and over again, pretending we were having tons of fun, but she's not an idiot. Sam stuck with me until I finally gave up, managing to reserve judgment, and determined, this year, to stay out of the eye of the birthday storm. And I was determined not to lose my mind like I did last year. But from the minute I woke up, I couldn't get out of my own way.

Eventually the art projects ended and breakfast happened and Sam packed Quinn up and took her to school. I was home alone, going through my mental list of things to do before her birthday party with Corey & Kellam: clean the house, make pesto, bake a cake, make some ice cream, wrap her present.

I found myself staring at her birthday present—one of those cool little bikes with no pedals, designed to help kids learn to balance and glide. I had picked it out on my own. A badass little number, with bright orange handles, and red and orange flames painted on the bike's black sides. What I realized, as I stood staring at it, was that it was the bike I wanted to want, but I didn't really want it.

The toy store had one other design that I hadn't seen, but they had told me about it on the phone: it had "some grass and flowers and things." Not nearly as cool. Sam was excited about the flames. Corey was also excited about the flames. But somehow the flames made me feel anxious. They made me hyper sensitive to the idea of her entire little-girlhood slipping away too fast—as if buying her the bike with flames would be fast-forwarding her into a future of skinny jeans and piercings and dyed black hair. Before my coffee was gone, I hated that bike.

I hated it so much that I packed it back in my car and then drove half an hour back to the toy store, in time to be there when it opened. I explained that I was having second thoughts on my choice and wondered if I could switch it for the one with "grass and flowers and things." The saleswoman was kind—she clearly thought I was insane, but she didn't say so. These bikes are for two year olds—I knew that and she knew that—and two year olds don’t really care. She was kind and she was also covered in tattoos and her hair was spiky and black. And even though I have nothing against tattoos and spiky black hair, I knew I was doing the right thing.

What I was doing was trying to slow it all down because already it all seems to be slipping away too fast. 

In the year since her last birthday, Quinn has learned to walk and to run and to jump. She's learned to go get her little owl apron when I ask her if she wants to bake with me, and she's learned to stir the batter in the bowl. She's learned to bite and hit, and she's learned to say she's sorry. She's learned how to go up and down the stairs by herself, and how to climb into our deep tub by herself. In the past twelve months, she learned to say a few words, and then a few more, and now she says things like: Dad's big truck. Be right back, Mom. Please, Mom. Thank you, Mom. And when she doesn't want me to do something, or she doesn't want to eat something I'm trying to give her, she says, emphatically, No thank you, please! And when she's sad, or tired, she says, I wanna hug. And, I love you. And lately, she says, I'm two!

Right now, just after her second birthday, I sense this moment of perfection in Quinn's life. She is still so tiny and soft and baby-like, and she is also so fully formed, with so many distinctive traits that I've come to think of as so very Quinn.

But in the midst of this sweet little perfectness there are already glimpses of her growing up. A couple of weeks ago, I actually saw her blush for the first time; she was belly laughing over the sudden loud noise of the food processor when she pushed the button, and she glanced over and saw that Corey was laughing too. One minute she was laughing, the next minute she was burning under bright red cheeks, aware of his attention, aware of herself. How is it possible that this has happened already? How am I ever going to enjoy her birthdays if each year all I can think about is all that is irretrievable? Another thing Quinn has learned how to do recently is climb out of her crib. As I'm feeling a desperate need to hold on, she’s already trying to escape.

I don't know how I'm supposed to handle all the letting go. And I don't know how to break this birthday pattern, but I find myself, again this year, thinking about how crazy it is that you bring another life into the world, through your own flesh and blood, and by virtue of doing that, you love that being more than anything--more than yourself--and what's expected of you next is that each day, for the rest of your life, you let that being go a little more and then a little more and then a little more. And the irony of course is that each day, Quinn is a little more, and she says a little more, and she does a little more, and she gives a little more, and it becomes increasingly harder to do that thing I'm supposed to do: to let her find her own balance...and let her glide.

©2012 Corey Hendrickson - All Rights Reserved

©2012 Corey Hendrickson - All Rights Reserved

Happy Birthday Quinn. 

I love you.

Return to Rainy River

Every fall, in my American Literature class, I read The Great Gatsby with my students. Not very original, I know, but classics are classics for a reason. And every year, when Nick realizes that Gatsby believes, without doubt, that he and Daisy will simply rewind the clock together, erasing what's happened in the years since their separation, and erasing the people they've become in order to go back to the people they once were, I join Nick in his incredulity and marvel over the absurdity of Gatsby's point of view. "You can't repeat the past," Nick tells Gatsby every fall, and every fall Gatsby replies, "Of course you can!"

Despite my annual criticisms of Jay Gatsby, it turns out I've been guilty of similar thinking.

Last November I turned 40, and my friend Char turned 60. For years we imagined some sort of epic adventure to commemorate this shared milestone. For a while, that epic adventure was supposed to be a trek in Nepal. In fact, when I turned 30 I was also supposed to go to Nepal—it was the planned destination that semester for my traveling school, but the summer before our departure, Nepal's crown prince went berzerk and killed 9 members of his royal family, before shooting himself. He too died days later and Nepal was in turmoil, so we planned to go to Thailand instead. It was September of 2011 and Thailand didn't happen either, but now I'm getting off track.

As the big 40/60 birthday year approached, Char and I started discussing Nepal again. And Sam was on board too—he bought me a guidebook for my 39^th birthday and promised to help me get to the Himalayas the following year. By the time 40 was approaching, Quinn had just turned one, and she was crawling, and cute, and starting to really grow on me. And the more I thought about being away for three or more weeks, the time it would take us to really do the trip the right way, the more petrified I became. I knew I wasn't ready to leave.

The problem was that my traveling partner was in a different position: For Char, getting to Nepal sooner rather than later was going to be important. I was so afraid of backing out on her...I didn't want to let her down. But, I got lucky: she was asked to join a big geology trip to Egypt last winter and, by the time she got back, she felt like she had used up her "out of the comfort zone" big adventure for the year. Either that or she sensed my anxiety and gave me an easy out. Either way, I could exhale: I was off the hook.

Instead of the Himalayas, we started discussing other trip options a bit closer to home. Pretty quickly we arrived at the idea of doing a paddling trip; for a number of years, Char and I would go on a paddling trip together every summer—so this idea brought us back to our roots, and we liked that. And once we knew we wanted to paddle, we pretty quickly focused our thoughts on the Boundary Waters—one of the world's quiet water Meccas.

Last March we started planning and what we pulled together was a week-long backcountry loop of lakes and portages in Canada's Quetico Provincial Park, the Canadian side of the Boundary Waters. We agreed to drive out, leaving from her Adirondack camp the day after Sam's annual Lake Placid lacrosse tournament ended. And from the moment our plan for the trip came to be, I looked forward to it every day.

I looked forward to the quiet water, and the quiet. I looked forward to the new scenery, and the adventure of it all. I looked forward to reuniting with my old gear—my beloved one-person tent, my favorite-ever sleeping bag which has been a comforting friend on countless great adventures since its first in 1993—a week on the Long Trail with Kim. I looked forward to seeing my trusty and easy to light, no muss no fuss camp stove, and my favorite pewter spoon found in the basement kitchen at Adventure Quest before my first international trip—my eating utensil of choice on every single camping trip since. I even looked forward to the two-day drive out, and the two-day drive back, because a good roadtrip, with a good friend, is good for the soul.

On every bad day, between March and the beginning of August, I thought ahead to my trip and took solace in knowing that it would eventually arrive. Ten days on my own, I felt sure, was going to be like going back in time. I was going to be free—of people and schedules and expectations—and navigating through a new wilderness was going to be a great adventure. Schlepping my two heavy packs, my paddle and our canoe over 18 rough portages (some a third to a half-mile long) was going to be physically demanding. We would be camping among bears, and moose, and wolves. And we didn't know fully what to expect—it was perfect. I couldn't wait to get going—to get moving back into my old skin—the free and independent and adventurous former me who, for the past seven years has been too busy building a house and building a marriage and growing a baby to get out and do anything as awesome as the things I used to do all the time. I've been missing that girl and I couldn't wait to find her again, somewhere out in western Ontario in the middle of the big woods.

My mind is like that—very black and white. The trip would be good. My old self was better than my new self, and I just needed a trip to bring her back. All things clear and absolute. Rather Gatsby-like really. 

As our departure date got closer and closer, the panic started to settle in. Sam was off playing lacrosse and Quinn and I were home together. I was scrambling to get ready—to pack, to shop for my half of the camp food, to leave things at school in order so I could return from the trip and go right to the opening day of school the next day, to pay the bills, clean the house, buy diapers and supplies to keep Sam stocked for the ten days that I would be away…And in the midst of all that work, despite my attempts not to think about it, I started to wonder how I was going to be away from Quinn for that many days.

The trip was a nice idea, but it was proving to be a tough reality. I had worried about whether I was in shape enough to handle the physical challenges, but it had never crossed my mind to wonder whether I would be equipped to handle the emotional challenges. It's been so long since my last big adventure that I had forgotten just how much I miss Sam when I'm away. And Quinn didn't even exist as an idea last time I did something like this. I didn't, at the time, know what it would feel like to have a tiny little person put her fleshy little palm to my cheek and say, "Mama." Or have that same little person, who can barely speak, put her finger to my chest and say, "You." And then point to herself and say, "Me." I didn't know what it would be like to hear her say, "happy" for the first time, or to say "thank you" for the first time, after 23 months. But these were the words she started saying in the days just before I left: You and Me. Happy. Thank you. 

For the word-lover in me, the irony was too much.

The night before I left, when I couldn't stand to hear her cry in her portable crib at Char's camp, I went upstairs to get her and I sat on the floor with her, and she asked me for "Baby Rocky?" which is what she says when she wants me to cradle her in my arms and sing Rock-a-bye Baby. And I held her as she asked me to and I cried my eyes out. How could I be so selfish as to leave her for 10 days? What if she calls for me and I'm not there, and I'm not even close to coming back? And what happens if, heaven-forbid, something happens to Quinn's mom when she's out on her big adventure? What if I don't come back? And if I do, how am I ever going to be able to let her out of my sight when she's older to have the same kinds of adventures that have been so important to me?

As I sat there holding her and worrying about all this and sobbing, Quinn did this amazing thing: she poked me gently on the nose and started to laugh this sort of fake little laugh…like she was trying to cheer me up but didn't quite know how, and she did it over and over again until finally I was laughing instead of crying. And then I felt even worse about leaving…I knew I'd be lost without her.

The next morning was miserable. We were packed and ready to go by 7:30, and Sam and Quinn walked us to the driveway to say goodbye. I kissed them and got in the car and the last thing I heard was Quinn's little voice: "Bye-bye Mama." I don't remember when I stopped crying, but I eventually did. And sometime after that, Char and I started to catch up, and as we talked the miles and the hours started to pass. And that night I called Sam and he said they were okay. And the next morning, we were up early and driving again. And I knew Char didn't want to spend her trip talking about what was waiting back home, so I learned to keep my thoughts mostly to myself, but I can tell you I thought about Quinn about 98% of the time, despite how good it eventually felt to be paddling, and despite how beautiful everything was.

After dinner, on our first night out, we endured a spectacular thunderstorm with an incredible amount of close lightning. The site I had picked for my tent was ideal for minimizing mosquitos—it was up high, next to a bald rock, away from the trees. It was also ideal for a lightning strike. I spent a few hours lying in my tent listening to the torrential rain and thunder, wishing I was in a different place—not because I was worried about my safety, but because I was worried about putting Quinn's mom in danger. Eventually my anxiety about being struck motivated me to move and I ventured out into the deluge, resigned to the fact that from that point forward I'd be wet for the rest of the night. I unstaked my tent, dragged it down the rocky hill in the pitch black night and set it up next to Char's in a more protected spot down low. Eventually, when I had redone everything and climbed back into my sleeping bag, the storm started to move off, the rain slowed to a drizzle and the world got quiet enough that we were able to hear a timber wolf howling in the distance. It was brief and eerie and magical, and after I heard it I was finally able to fall asleep.

By the time we rounded the southwestern end of our loop days later, and were headed back toward our northeastern end point, I started to really enjoy what we were doing. My body felt firm in places it hasn't in years, and my head felt more clear as well. Quinn never left my thoughts, but somehow it was easier psychologically once we were at least headed toward home—even though we were still days away.

Toward the end of the trip our route was right along the border between the US and Canada—running up the middle of our last chain of lakes. One morning we got an early start and the fog was still lifting over glassy water. We paddled in silence a couple of the last days—Char and I out of sync in our thoughts, despite moving as one on the water. The lakes were narrow that morning and the wooded shorelines were close together—an easy swim if you chose to make it. 

As I paddled I thought of another story: Tim O'Brien's "On the Rainy River" which was named after this very part of the world (we were in the Rainy River District). His story was the story of a young man with a Vietnam draft card in his pocket, sitting in the bow of a boat with the US just behind him and Canada just in front. The old man fishing guide steers the boat wordlessly toward the Canadian shore, and then puts his fishing line in the water and waits. The young man is paralyzed—torn between his sense of family and responsibility, and his desire for freedom and life. In his mind, he jumps in the water, swims to the opposite shore and starts running; he never looks back. But in reality, he doesn't move, and eventually the old man brings him back.

The whole landscape up there is, at times, motionless. It's easy to get turned around, and when you do, you're not sure what you're looking at. 

Gliding through those boundary waters, I felt the same polar pulls within myself, but where one idea ended and another began wasn't always clear. I went up there thinking family would be put on hold for self, responsibility paused for freedom, home and away both distinct. But I realized that is two-dimensional thinking in a three-dimensional life. Family for me is no longer different from self. Responsibility and freedom no longer mutually exclusive. Home stayed with me no matter how far I went.

On our last full day we got to camp before noon and had a long afternoon and evening to spend. I was glad for the time to reflect before returning to the car, and the world, and before heading home. I have a romantic view of what backcountry trips are all about—I always think they are going to be so much fun, and then always they are more difficult than I remember. And of course that's what makes them so important: they challenge our sense of who we are and what we're capable of. Schlepping my gear through buggy woods, and swampy trails, paddling from lake to lake, I realized I wasn't journeying back to a former self—I was getting more acquainted with a new one. I used to feel proud of my adventures, but I've never felt more proud of anything than being Quinn's mom. My last night in the tent, instead of thinking about what I had gained, I was glad to realize what I had lost: the idea that there is a difference between the old and the new.

The day we left the Quetico and got back to the car to head home, we stopped at a little store on our way down the Gunflint Trail to ask about driving routes. I saw a postcard with the image of a beautiful wolf and picked it up. The caption on the back explained "The gray wolf mates for life...all the members of the pack help to care for the young…A lone wolf will give a beautiful and haunting howl when separated from its pack."

We never saw any black bears, and never saw a moose. But I heard the wolf howl—I'm quite sure of that. That and the fact that you can't repeat the past…and right now, that's just fine; I can't imagine going back.

Fusion

Sitting next to my friend Tei at the bar years ago, when Sam and I were only just contemplating having a kid, she told me, with a light-hearted chuckle, "you know, if you guys have kids, we won't be friends anymore…" It came as a blow, and I quickly denied having had any real thoughts about reproducing. Tei later said that she didn't remember saying it, and even if she had, she must've been joking—at least sort of. Nevertheless, I thought about the possibility of losing friends…in particular, this great group of girlfriends with whom I waitressed on Friday nights, and skied on Sunday mornings, and did all kinds of other adventurous and hilarious things. They were active and intelligent and full of life and fun, and a kind of girl power that I couldn't get enough of. There were some men in the extended group as well: Tei's husband, Cecil, was the chef at the restaurant, and Goto tended the bar and knew the name, drink, profession and family history of every single person who came through the door more than once.

Working in a restaurant, especially the busiest restaurant in a busy ski town, is an incredible rush. In the restaurant's peak years, there was a line of people waiting for us to open every Friday throughout the winter. We'd cram down our dinner and then we'd run, from five o'clock straight through to the end of the night, after three hundred or so people had had their meals. At the end of the shift, we had the place to ourselves, to change the music, to swap stories, and to laugh. Sometime after midnight, we'd lock up and walk out together, pockets full of cash. It was like we'd just left a great party, only we got paid a lot of money to be there. And in the years when I was saving every penny, to pay off my car and save money toward building our house, it was perfect: I had a social outlet every week, and I earned money rather than spending it. More importantly, the people I worked with became close and reliable friends. Each of us, at the time (except for Tei and Cecil), was unmarried, but in a committed relationship. We liked doing the same things and we had the same types of schedules. Our lives were on essentially parallel tracks.

But, as the saying goes, all good things come to an end.

For the restaurant, the end came when the Recession hit, the snow didn't fall, and the people didn't come. The business started to struggle, and then it started to collapse. And as it collapsed, things got ugly…it was a slow and painful death in many ways, and it was hard for everyone to watch. The once beloved gathering place for many local friends sat empty.

The parallel lives of friends also started to diverge. Some of the relationships ended. Some continue to evolve. My own life saw more commitments rather than less: House. Wedding. Baby. Toddler.

Almost two and a half years ago, as the restaurant was taking its last gasps of air, the group came up to the house for dinner. I was about halfway through my pregnancy and endured a lot of teasing about my future profession making breastmilk cheese (ick), and about it being The Last Supper, because "when people have kids," they joked, "they only hang out with other people who have kids."

As has been true with most of this parenting experience, I've found that many of the things that people tell you will happen actually do happen—even when you don't want them to.

After Quinn was born, Sam and I did stop socializing as much. We did lose a lot of our freedom. We have wished for more friends with kids so that we'd be able to find other people who would be willing to eat dinner before 6pm. When school is in session, it's all we can do to keep up—to grade the papers, wash our clothes periodically, be sure the bills are paid. Now that we're on vacation, we look around and realize there is no easy social outlet for us. Our friends without kids are much more mobile than we are, and yet we worry about inviting them here out of a self-consciousness about how demanding Quinn is on our attention and energy—not wanting to subject them to it and thinking they won't understand. Our friends with kids, those who are our lifelong friends, through good times and bad, are equally busy and mostly live far away.

But one thing I've realized recently is that I've been dwelling so much on the ways things have changed in my life, that I haven't noticed how some things have stayed the same, and other things have evolved to be even better than they were. 

Last week, after trying and failing many times in the past year, Cathy and I managed to get together. We went paddling early one evening and as we talked I realized that she's been busy in her life too, making sense of her own transitions. And on our way home, we saw Stacy's car in front of the bar where she works one night a week, and we went in to see her. And I realized then that she too is busy, making decisions and changes in life. When we all said goodbye, we agreed to try to get together for real sometime soon, and then, by some stroke of good luck and determination, another dinner party plan came to be.

Yesterday, as I cleaned the house, and put the chicken and the zucchini in their marinades, and I made a batch of vanilla ice cream, and I picked blueberries to go into my peach and blueberry pie, and I rolled out the crusts, and then cleaned again, I felt like it was Christmas. I felt nervous and excited about the prospect of having everyone arrive for dinner...all these friends I had only seen sporadically and one-on-one in the past year.

At five o'clock, Stacy arrived with a bottle of rosé and her dog, and we went for a walk, and then we sat on the porch and talked, as Sam and Quinn played ball. And then Cecil and Tei arrived, with a cooler full of food—a marinated pork loin and an Asian-spiced slaw—and a twelve pack of Yuengling beer from Pennsylvania, where Cecil and Sam both grew up. Eventually, Cathy and Goto showed up with bags full of fresh food, some ginger beer, beautiful Ahi tuna, marinated local beef, spinach for salad and the biggest, reddest tomato I've ever seen from Cathy's CSA. And within moments of everyone's arrival, everything was happening at once—dogs were running in and out of the house, plates and bowls were being pulled from cabinets, chilled glasses were retrieved from the freezer, ice was clinking, corks were popping, laughter, compliments and wise cracks exchanged, drinks were poured, salads were tossed, wasabi was mixed, meat was seasoned, the grill was lit, and dinner came to be with such ease that it was as if we'd done it once a week for years. And we had, only not in what has felt like a very long time.

I was so overjoyed having them all there, I felt like I had been resurrected from the dead. At one point, I just stopped and took it all in: Cathy and Goto cutting that giant tomato on the tiniest possible cutting board, laughing. Tei and Cecil and Sam laughing around the island. Stacy sitting with Quinn at her little table, doing something together as if it has always been that way. And while I worried that Quinn would somehow ruin the evening, she didn't. She hid behind her pacifier most of the night, but when Stacy put her hands out in front of her, Quinn put her hands out to touch them. And when someone tickled her feet that were up on the counter as she sat in Sam's lap, she giggled. And later, eventually, she gained enough confidence to move around on her own, and she gave Stacy's dog Sequoia all kinds of love, and she navigated the kitchen amidst all of their unfamiliar legs.

On cue, Quinn went to bed without a noticeable fuss. I took my time getting her through her routine—I put on her pajamas and read a few books in the rocking chair. I set the fan up for her in her room. I kissed her goodnight and waved to her as I closed her sliding glass doors.

And on cue, just as the grilling was nearly complete, Sam holding the umbrella over Cecil as he turned the meat, and Goto running things in and out of the house, the rain we've been waiting for for weeks and weeks started to fall. It fell in a deluge, deafening on the metal roof, wind twisting in the trees, thunder and lightning just overhead, everyone cheering its arrival.

We lit candles in anticipation of losing power, and sat down to eat—the table a beautiful spread of beautiful food, and the familiar dance of friends telling stories, laughing, Goto filling drinks, Cecil passing platters, each person holding dishes for the next. The quiet moment of first bites, a pause in the action, and the chef: "Wow. There are so many good, complex flavors happening here!" And then more action, more stories swirling with laughter. Tei dishing out Tei-sized portions of dessert (she eats like a linebacker despite being the size of a wood nymph), everyone asking for recipe tips, the dogs barking just a split-second before the next big thunder clap. All the while rain soaking the parched earth, and Sam smiling at me from the other end of the table, and Quinn somehow sleeping upstairs.

"Kudos to you guys," Cecil said at one point, his glass in the air, "for managing to still connect with old friends. I know it must be hard with a little kid." They thanked us for hosting and in that moment I honestly could have cried from relief and gratitude—how nice to have them there, how thankful I was to see them at our table.

Eventually we heard a squack from upstairs, inevitable given the violence of the storm outside. Sam went up and retrieved Quinn and she came to sit on my lap with her lamb. She put one arm around my neck and hid her face on my shoulder.

I was glad to have her with me in the late night company of my old friends—something that once seemed so incongruous and impossible but, last night, was akin to water on parched earth. So much nourishment for the soul…so many good complex flavors in this life. 

The Loveliness of Trees

The first time Sam took me to the family compound, we had only just met the previous month. At the end of our ten-day Wilderness First Responder class, he returned home to Virginia, and I returned to my school in southern Vermont. It was September of 2001, and when 9/11 happened, it was a gorgeous and clear day. I spent every hour watching the television in shock with my students, and Sam spent his watching the Pentagon burn from the roof of the library at his school. We spoke briefly on the phone when he called me from Virginia—a phone call that seemed momentous, by virtue of his thinking of me in that historic and terrible moment.

My school was supposed to be heading to Thailand for the semester, but with the world so suddenly unfamiliar, we changed our plan and decided to travel to the desert Southwest, to climb and hike in the protected red rock canyons. Before my departure, Sam proposed we meet, one more time, at his parents' house in the Poconos of northeastern Pennsylvania.

We had only known each other a short time, and though I felt, from the moment I first spoke to him in the lunch line on our first day in NH, that he was the man I was meant to marry, I wouldn't have voiced that certainty out loud. I wasn't at all sure how he felt, but once I arrived in PA, my sense of him as a person expanded like a deep breath. His parents were away, but his brother was staying in the main house with a friend, or friends…I can't really remember them. What I do remember is every detail of my time with Sam in that special place.

We stayed in the cabin, separated slightly from the main house by a wooden deck. At twelve feet by sixteen, with a small woodstove and a sleeping loft, it was the kind of place I could have easily called home, especially given that I was living out of my backpack at the time. I was falling in love with Sam as quickly as my days were running out (before my departure to Utah), and our time in Pennsylvania was a big part of that. In the mornings Sam made coffee and we walked the perimeters of the various fields and meadows watching the progress of his slow, old dog Chester who was not at all confident I was a welcome addition to his love affair with the gentle and handsome Sam. On those walks I learned the history of the place, of Sam's paternal grandparents who bought 80 acres on that hilltop, and the summers spent there over many decades as the Jackson clan continued to expand. Sam's father is the youngest of four, three brothers and a sister: Ellsworth, then Calvin, then Elinor and Bruce—Sam's dad who, when he arrived at Yale, exercised his much-anticipated freewill by choosing to shed the name he'd been called by family (of which he had never been particularly fond), and introducing himself by his first given name of Sam.

When the grandparents passed on, the land was parceled out among the children, and Sam's father and each of his siblings grew and raised families of their own, who gathered there for vacations and family reunions over many years—some building, some camping, some just stopping by. By now Aunt Nip is gone, and Ellsworth and Cal are in their eighties, with Sam and Alden thankfully a healthy distance behind them in years, but each Fourth of July, the extended clan still returns, more cousins among the four tribes than I can keep count of, and certainly more of their children than I can ever keep straight. But each among them is warm and welcoming, more so than most people I've  met, and each is eager to hear and share the news of the year.

The family's branches return gradually over the holiday from a variety of bases in all four directions. And each, it seems, follows the same itinerary once there: unload at your tribe's designated place, and then meander down the dirt road, past Uncle Ells' house with the bronze Buddha out front, down to the pond for a swim. After catching up with whomever else is there, eventually, everyone meanders back to base, passing still more cousins on the way, agreeing to connect again after dinner, to see each other at the bonfire for the fireworks, to be back for another swim. The hillside is speckled with truck-sized blueberry bushes, in woods and meadows alike, and you gather and eat fistfuls wherever you go.

That first morning, eleven years ago, as Sam and I walked across the top of Aunt Nip's long sloping meadow, and worked our way down along the stone wall, amidst the cherry and ash woods, he told me that he pictured his wedding happening right there…with cousins everywhere, and a Frisbee game in the afternoon, and a pig roasting in a pit. When he described it to me, I wished myself into the scene. Some time later, when I first met his eclectic Uncle Ellsworth, who had been a Presbyterian minister, like his own father and brother both, bejeweled in turquoise rings and a curious robe, with white hair and stories of travel and thoughts on spiritual matters, I imagined him into the wedding story as well, delivering our vows in full summer sun. When Sam and I eventually did marry, it was in Vermont, in November, and without most of the people who make up this special family place. Our wedding was lovely, and special in its own way, but had I to do it over again, I would do it, gladly, as Sam first envisioned it.

Joining this tribe has been a relatively easy process given how gracious everyone is, but still it is in my nature to be worried about fitting in. That first visit, when Sam's parents weren’t there, I went upstairs in the main house to take a shower. On the way, I passed a portrait of his dad, the private school educated, Yale and Cambridge graduated, English teacher, holding a copy of The Odyssey. I was in my first high school teaching job, trying to figure out how to teach English, having not yet read The Odyssey, which of course I have done since. Sam's parents met at Cambridge. His brother went to Yale, as did his two sisters, the eldest of whom was also an English major. How could I spend a lifetime with this man, I wondered, and manage to never talk about books with his father or sister? How could I prevent them from knowing I was a phony? It didn't help that for a long time Sam's dad called me Curry instead of Kerry. But, at one of those Fourth of July gatherings, I was grateful to overhear him talking with his sister, Nip. "Curry? Who's Curry?" she demanded. When he identified me, Sam's girlfriend, Aunt Nip scolded him, "Curry? Her name is Kerry!" I didn't know her for long, but I certainly loved her for that.

There have been other moments when I have marked my progress into the clan as well, but none more completely than with the offering of Quinn Jackson into the tribe. 

When we arrived for the Fourth in 2010, I was 7 months pregnant and cousin Rob crossed a whole field to lay hands on the belly and bow down to offer some whacky and wonderful little blessing. A year later, sitting inside Uncle Ells' house, singing songs and eating ice cream to mark his 85^th birthday, Rob was sitting on the floor and Quinn (who could not yet walk) worked her way to his side, placed her hand on his knee and gazed up at him, eager, I imagine, to finally meet him. 

Last week, as I sat in the yard with Betsy, a soul sister-cousin whom I've come to love dearly, Sam went inside with Quinn to visit with his uncles, Ellsworth and Cal, and Quinn, having taken off all of her clothes in some sort of private celebration, lay stretched out and sleeping in the recliner, completely naked in the midst of the conversation, never waking despite the many openings and closings of the door, or the many exclamations of delight over her condition. "She is so comfortable in her life!" said Ells, and I thought of her father who is also that way.

On Ells' birthday this year, I was at the house alone while Quinn napped and Sam and his parents went to town for groceries. I looked up to see Ells coming to the side porch, his walking staff in hand, ski goggles and wide hat protecting his face from the sun. He was alarmingly unsteady in his gait, until he sat on the edge of the porch to rest. I went out, and helped him into a chair to catch his breath, and brought him some water; his fingers still jeweled with turquoise. He wasn't really sure who I was, as his memory is failing him a bit by now, and I never really had secure footing there in the first place. He asked me questions about his brother's house, and my connection to the clan, and whether or not I was still in college…I did my best to keep a straight face on that one, and tried as well to fill in the gaps.

Ells told me all about his current life, living in the "personal care home for the elderly," of which, he told me, he was one. He gazed out over Alden's gardens, the blueberry bushes and the landscape beyond them. "I've been thinking lately about the loveliness of trees," he said, "and the beauty they have to offer." I listened in agreement, feeling it a privilege to share that moment with him, bearing witness to his meditation, and meditating myself on the loveliness of trees. 

What an important ritual it is to gather with family for relaxed days and evenings, to hear the family stories. And for the elders to gather and take stock of how the clan has grown, and to take stock of their own lives, and enjoy the accomplishments brought forth for the offering.

How important for the men of the tribe to return to the stories of their youth, and in so doing, return to themselves.

And how important for the women of the tribe to gather in support of one another—to help each other laugh and be strong for the phases of family and the passing of the years. Through such a ritual, I understand now more than ever, we gather the strength needed to continue creating our own stories, and forming our own offerings to the tribe.

One night after dinner, when Sam and I walked down to Ells' house with some cold beer, we circled the house in the dark, peeking in the lit up windows to find Betsy and her daughters Jesse and Claire, and her sleepy granddaughter, Elizabeth. We snuck in the back door as they divvied up the work of counting the pills and arranging the necessaries of the elders who laboriously headed off to bed. After half an hour of laughing with them, before turning in ourselves, Sam and I snuck back into the cabin, past the sleeping Quinn, and slept soundly, despite the oppressive heat.

Last month was the one-year anniversary of changing my name to Jackson. I mentioned it to Sam in passing. "You've been a Jackson in my heart for much longer," he replied. Whether this is true, or Sam is just being the romantic poet he often is, I do feel more and more every year that I've found my people, and I'm grateful to know I have a branch, and so does Quinn.

Someday, when Quinn is old enough to remember it, we imagine having a pagan "christening" of sorts for her, during which we will gather her clan—her godless father and fairy godmother, among others—to welcome her formally into this life. Discussing such an event recently, Sam suggested we "bake her a giant cake in the shape of a lotus, and then we spend hours decorating it with pixie sticks, painting an elaborate mural that Quinn can then blow away in a symbolic gesture toward the impermanence of human life." It struck me right away as a good idea, both hilariously Sam and beautiful—a reminder to value the here and now, and of the only true eternal life—that which is handed down in stories, through the branches of the tree.

Mirror Mirror

On Friday, Beth at daycare told me that Quinn has been taking food off of other people's plates. She did it at my friend Kim's house recently too. It was Asa's second birthday party and Quinn and Asa were sitting at a little table together, mostly staring at each other while they ate their snacks. All of a sudden, Quinn got up and walked over to Asa. I thought, "how sweet, she's going to give her a hug." Quinn looked Asa in the eye and then grabbed her crackers and walked away.  I am so embarrassed by this behavior. I keep trying to figure out, why is it that my kid is such a pig? While Quinn is in her high chair, smearing hummus all over her face, I find myself thinking about how much work I have to do to domesticate her, and then, without thinking, I reach down and snag a piece of uneaten avocado off of her plate. Oh. My. God...

Now, picture this: Sam has just climbed up and over a huge brush pile dragging a giant tarp in an attempt to keep the pile dry until he can get around to burning it. He stumbles a couple of times, a leg pops through the branches here and there…it's not a graceful process. And, just as he makes it back to solid ground and looks up at the pile, now covered by blue plastic, a gust of wind lifts the whole tarp in a graceful ripple and it goes sailing through the air, landing somewhere nearby. He loses it. Quinn and I are standing 50 feet away, looking in the garden for signs of the seeds we've planted. The wind, fortunately, is quite loud. My hope is that she can't hear her father screaming, arms outstretched to the sky, middle fingers leading the way, "Fuck You, Wind! Fuck You!" His rant at the heavens lasts at least two minutes.

This morning, I glance over at Quinn in time to see her try to step into her yellow rain boot. Her toe hits the top of the boot and knocks it over. AHHHHHHHHHHHH! Immediately she is screaming, stomping her feet and flailing her arms. In the midst of the screaming, I'm certain I hear, "Fuck You, Yellow Rain Boot! Fuck You!"

When you think about reproducing with someone, there's usually a lot of sappy, "I hope the baby has your eyes" talk. But I wonder if it ever dawns on people to talk about what they hope won't be reproduced.

Sam's temper is a curious thing. Circumstances that I believe merit real and unmitigated fury don't seem to bother him in the slightest. He goes to that other place and it all just rolls off his back. On the other hand, he will utterly lose it over some little frustration that could easily be solved with a deep breath and some problem solving. Being so polar opposite in our reactions to stress comes in handy sometimes; we can take turns talking each other off the ledge. But, I will admit to being a bit stunned during those moments when I've had to step in and say things like, "Sam, maybe you should set down the hammer."

With Quinn's temper tantrums, I've decided not to swoop in and solve the problems for her (I'm sure Sam wishes he had the same luxury), in hopes that she'll learn to take a deep breath and find a new strategy. Nevertheless, I find that it's still easy to get muddled in my thinking. The screaming, the lack of sleep, the lack of sleep (did I say that already?) these things mess me up.  And, periodically when I'm feeling confused and I've lost sight of the long-term view, and I'm stuck in the right now, as in I must make the screaming stop, right now, periodically I resort to books, which I'm not convinced is an entirely good idea. 

I recently borrowed the popular new Bringing Up Bebe  from my French sister-in-law Geraldine. When she was previewing some of the key concepts in the book for me, I thought, "Yeah, that's all familiar…that's how I was raised too." I ate what my mother cooked for dinner. I greeted guests who came to the house. I waited for things. From Geraldine's preview, none of it seemed that foreign, but still I thought I should read it…just in case—just in case there was some obvious solution to the grocery store temper tantrums, or the high chair acrobatics, or the "No! No! No!" response to every food but raisins. Or, if there was some secret to solving the night wake-ups that are no longer infrequent and now involve her sleeping in our bed anytime from 2 a.m. on, every single night, for the past month. 

You may or may not recall the first bout of co-sleeping we had last September when Quinn had her first ever ear infection. We brought her to our bed only after multiple nights of sitting upright in the chair with her while she slept, and more nights of trying to let her "cry it out." You may or may not recall that after long hours of crying, Quinn never managed to get "it" out, whatever "it" was. And, you may or may not recall that we went 10 hours at a go, more than once, with Quinn screaming on-and-off the whole entire time…but we do. And we also have a distinct memory of the shame of feeling negligent, cruel and, at the same time, defeated.

Well, she's back at it. She wakes up, she screams, and then she screams some more. I know, having endured those 10-hour nights, that she won't get it out. And so now, in this latest round of sleeplessness, we haven't even bothered to let her "cry it out" because it seems so laughable, and because we never feel like we can afford a sleepless night. But, still, we know we need to regain some sanity soon.

If any of this could be solved, well, then reading this new book would certainly be worthwhile, wouldn't it? Chapter 3 in Bringing Up Bebe is called "Doing Her Nights." The author talks at length about the French habit of "pausing" before going to the crying baby in order to let the baby return to sleep on her own. Nice idea. She then talks about the unfortunate reality that sometimes pausing doesn’t work and parents need to resort to a more firm approach to "sleep training." Even though I've read all this before, for some reason yesterday I kept reading and, I'll be honest, I wish I hadn't, because now, in the middle of the night when Quinn has woken us up, convinced us it's hopeless and tricked us into bringing her to our bed, taken over my pillow and started snoring along with Darth Vader next to her, now I'll have this little gem from Druckerman's book to mull over, while I lie there staring at the clock:

"At nine months old, she still wakes up every night at around two a.m. So we brace ourselves to let her cry it out. On the first night, she cries for twelve minutes. (I clutch Simon's arm and cry, too). Then she goes back to sleep. The next night she cries for five minutes. On the third night, Simon and I both wake up to silence at two a.m. 'I think she was waking up for us,' Simon says. 'She thought that we needed her to do it.' Then we go back to sleep."

Twelve minutes?! Merde! 

What I need Quinn to do is to sleep, or at least learn how to go downstairs and make coffee in the morning. Either one of those two things would be great. And, in the meantime, if you have any advice on when I should ignore her pleas and when I should listen, that would be great too. Because Quinn just handed me a handful of clean diapers and I ignored her. Then, she peed on the rug. If only I was making this stuff up.