Coffee, Declarations, crazy hour , The Kissing Hand and poetry.

Grateful for:

The Morrises, who surprised me with a coffee machine. I don't know why! They just like to give stuff. I love the Morrises.

Che walked into my room.

'Mum!' He says

'Yes?' I reply.

'I LOVE you.' He turns and walks out, stops at the door. 'I love you a lot.'

Hehehe, and it's just a fact, a something that was true and had to be spoken, he says it in a serious voice. I laugh when i picture him one day saying 'Wife!' 

'I love you.'

'i love you a lot.'

Haha, and it spins me out that i am mother to this future man.

Jacien, he is always my baby everything. We read a book called 'The Kissing Hand' a newly acquired addition from the last bookclub order. In the book, a little racoon is afraid on the first day of school- his mum places a kiss in the palm of his hand and tells him to hold it to his face whenever he is scared, and it will bring his mothers love to his heart. Sappy i know.

But Jacien, well he opens my hand, kisses my palm. Holds it to my face. And grins at me. I love that he likes these ideas, knows the main messages of a book. He says to me, you are the best mummy in the whole world and daddy is the best daddy in the whole world. For the time being, this is truth to him.

Tivianh, Tivianh... the photo below captures a moment of her - where the sound that erupts from that open mouth ricochets still in my minds ear. I find myself always in this internal conversation with two schools of thought on her. She is sometimes wild. And this i love about her. But this is no wilderness, and there are rules to abide by. I don't like the labels that will befall her if she doesn't learn to adhere... she is messy, she is absent minded, absurd, impulsive. These are things i tell her to stop being, but i love them about her. I love the freedom of her 'Crazy hours' Haha and i hear myself saying TIVIANH! if you don't cut that out... 

and there's a part of me smiling, a part of me aching, a part of me hoping that she will never lose this tendency to just BE. To heck with the consequences.

She looks at me and gauges my reactions. 

CHE CHE! You always trust CHE! she declared when i asked her to desist 'helping' the clean up of toys and pull the blinds instead because i didn't trust her to pack it in the right places.

I reply that Che has shown me he can be trusted.

She stands on the bed and pokes her tongue out at me, hands on her hips and sings che che che che che.

Che ignores her completely. She giggles and jumps off. She is nothing like me as a child. But a lot like me now. 

I'm me as i am now, and this is all she knows of me i guess.

So it's probably my all my doing. Haha...

Anyway, i picked up Gwen Harwoods poetry collection.

One of the few joys i remember of Highschool English.

I had forgotten about this poem; 'In the Park'- i loved the imagery back then... but it never did apply to me.

Then horror when i read it today... haha and the happy realisation... i am sometimes this woman, but for the most part i am not. I refuse to be.

One day, in a park- when past lives meet; I will rewrite this poem as it should be.

Bathed in sunshine and washed with laughter.

I feel like telling her, to lift her head and smile... there is no greater space to be, no greater task to undertake.

Your job is amazing, your life will be too.  :)


In The Park

She sits in the park. Her clothes are out of date.
Two children whine and bicker, tug her skirt.
A third draws aimless patterns in the dirt
Someone she loved once passed by – too late

to feign indifference to that casual nod.
“How nice” et cetera. “Time holds great surprises.”
From his neat head unquestionably rises
a small balloon…”but for the grace of God…”

They stand a while in flickering light, rehearsing
the children’s names and birthdays. “It’s so sweet
to hear their chatter, watch them grow and thrive, ”
she says to his departing smile. Then, nursing
the youngest child, sits staring at her feet.
To the wind she says, “They have eaten me alive.” 

Gwen Harwood