The splashing of the water in the river, my girls jumping as I watched the droplets float and dance in the air, falling into the stream, where little snow boots stomped and danced about. The whimsical swinging of their little legs drew a smile, the tiny feet that will make big strides. Big ones furthered by their sweet smiles and catching personalities. I was watching from the verandah of the cabin we rented for the weekend in the middle of nowhere Tennessee. It was January and it was freezing cold but the kids were loving being on ‘caytion’ as my 3 year old called it. A vacation in the middle of winter to a riverside cabin wasn’t a norm for us. Everyone would’ve much rather a snow ski vacation with Daniel’s brother’s family. But I was in no condition to be around anyone else. How could these girls have been born of me? Someone so void of the happiness or joy gene? I would settle with the not wanting to die gene. To no volition of my mind, the joy hides in depths and creases I see glimmers of but never to meet its acquaintance. 

We were here because my selfish ass thought to be depressed and spent the last few months living in autopilot, watching in aerial view as my body performed all the basic motherly tasks, bathing the children, feeding them, taking them to school, preparing the teacher gifts for Christmas, delivering them, the worst of this all were the kisses I gave my husband but craved at the same time because I wasn’t in the shell that pressed the lips that were mine on his. He felt this, but he understood it. He loved me steadfast and firmly as the good man he is, that found my soul he weaved himself into vowing never to hurt nor part. He wanted me to feel better as is the norm around here it seemed. Everyone took care of me and I was just the deadweight heavy burden they all bear, my children included. He knew cabin vacations and just being in nature had revived me in the past. I needed to be dragged out of this episode. Riverside cabin was his choice to find me again and ease me back into my shell.

Water gave me calm, gave me a sense of drifting with its flow and stumbles on the rocks, the fairy dust like foaming that made bubbles bob on the surface of what was the steady flow hiding all the little wonders set my mind at ease. There were rocks and pebbles that with the rushing of that water that would smoothen with every hit and rush and abrasion. I reminded myself of the abrasions that may not smoothen me. It inspired me with the hope that if I were to imagine easing my being with the water and the stream, that in that reverie I could pretend the pain would smoothen out. I spent hours just staring at the water, the flow, the rush, the rocks, the birds that visited gliding across the stream. The trees forced into their rigid stance from a cold that dug into my bones, reminding me of the isolation in my mind that asserts the notion of the unworthiness tomorrow will bring as aggressive as it is in that current moment. Cold, frigid pain that filled my hollow shell.

“Mommy, I got a special stick for you.” Elsa loves collecting, rocks, sticks, whatever colors her wondrous mind. Anna rushes from the other end of the wrap around porch, stomping in her snow boots that met her knees, her awkward run tugged on my heart intensified with the wide grin and beady eyed look she would have as she approached me with her collection of mud and rocks. “I got this mommy, all by myself”. I reached for the cord in this cavity, I want to repel and find that crease of light way down below, I want to be in this with my children. I want to feel all the feelings of joy with them, for them, I wanted to be there. Present. I could not, I was still watching from afar. That shell smiled and noded, a limp hug for each child and a “that’s wonderful”.

They deserve better. They deserve me. I don’t even know what ‘me’ is anymore. If this version so distant and alienated from any form of emotion that was scarce of joy and true affection, I cannot see this as it being worth it. They deserve better and I don’t know how to do that. They deserve me without the loss of me to these episodes. They deserve all of me, all of the time. How will I ever be able to give them that?

I was so lonely in my shell. The goings on go on, I participate as half a shell unable to enjoy anything or provide any genuine affection of which my children caught on to and consequently chose their father as favorite parent, learning to not even bother to invite me on their expeditions of building or exploration or puzzles. I was left out, which was what I thought I needed, but the pain of not being part of their love was excruciating. Everything Daniel suggested I used, honesty in decline, sometimes with a docile and gentle no, sometimes with undeserved feisty show of words he showed no offense to. He understands, he loved me through it.

The next day Daniel decided to take the kids for a hike and I stayed back at the house. Resuming my position in the swing on the verandah. There were sweet songs of insects I could not name, a cacophony of beautiful trilling and buzzing. It seemed that they were speaking to me calling me into their symphony. A sweet song by Zee Avi came to my mind that I used to sing to the kids as infants, 

“I am a honey bee,

Shunned off from the colony

And they won’t let me in

So I left the hive,

They took away all my stripes*

And broke off both my wings

So I’ll find another tree

And make the wind my friend

I’ll just sing with the birds

They’ll tell me secrets of the world”

I sang the verse over and over as tears ran down my eyes to no logical tie. The heaviness rose in my chest, stopping high to push against my ribs and grabbing them inwards at the same time. I was suddenly in darkness as the lids of my eyes weighed heavy to close, softly nudging my voice into the tune,I could see and feel the soft skin of my babies’ cheeks I used to stroke as their eyes lazily blinked in the comfort of nursing from my breast, their bodies against the warmth of mine. In that moment the true emotions pushed through the crease and wrapped me in this memory of my children and my being. The pure love as I watched their chests rise and fall for nights on end at following their birth, the intense urgent love and care for them coursed through my chest into my veins, rushing up into my eyes as I released from the trance to see my children skipping rocks at the stream at the cabin. The beautiful giggles grabbed me, filled me with a power I knew was genuine. I knew with no cerebrate condition that it was love and I loved them and they loved me. The pain and hopelessness refused to leave me, but I curled up in the corner in my soul where my children and I lived in our love. Free of these episodes that will arrive again unpredictably. 

Perhaps tomorrow I will believe I am what is best for them, best for Daniel, best for the world. But for that night, I grabbed them and squeezed them both into our less than queen sized bed where I could feel them breathe and my warmth would give them assurance their mother was still here and that their mother needs them as much as they needed me. I would draw a breath every time Daniel exhaled gently and melodically on the back of my neck as his arms encased me in his strength and love that knew no bounds. His body on mine told me his love wasn’t waiting for me, it had always been with me, it loved me in all my forms, shell or not. I was the one found waiting. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps I will join him in his presence the way I want to, the way he deserves. Tonight I allow myself to melt into his embrace, stealing some strength for another day. 

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