Cleaning Out the Green Thing

I am cleaning today.  And tomorrow.  I’m hosting book group tomorrow night, and there’s much to be done.

I have this weird piece of furniture.  I call it the Green Thing.  My mom bought it for me from L.L.Bean years ago, when I was still with the X.  It’s sort of a credenza, which opens from the top, and holds files.  Hanging files.  There is a shelf underneath.

I like it.

It doesn’t match my house anymore.  It collects crap:  on top, on the shelf, inside the top.
But it stores stuff.  Old stuff.  Like this:

Waking Up Alone

The alarm goes off and I reach across the empty half of the bed to turn it off.   Rustling sounds from the next room tell me that it’s only a matter of minutes before little feed plod across the hall, their eyes still mostly shut, the body driven by memory.

3 months – 12 weeks.  They were gone, their first summer away, leaving them feeling torn and alone.  But only two days later and the summer already a distant memory.

But for the empty 1/2 of the bed.

Reminding me that my world is torn in two.  Two factions – seemingly irreconcilable.   

His soft snores.  The gentle tugging of the blankets I’ve stolen.  The feel of his arm reaching around my waist, pulling me closer in those pre-dawn hours.

The weekend mornings: playing catch up with our sleep, dragging out of bed at 11 a.m., going off to our favorite breakfast spot, not quite dressed for the day.  Combing the streets by foot or by car for hidden treasures at flea markets and yard sales.

The evenings of cooking, food not ready until 8 or 9 – going for walks until 11 or 12.  

But most of all, those those early dawn hours – just the knowledge that we’re together.  The ability to scoot over, mold myself to his back.  Or to feel him scoot over, his arm pulling me into the mold of his front.

Instead, today, the welcome sound of little feet, the soft sucking sound of a little thumb in a little mouth, seeing the satisfied, safe and loved little lips curving into a little smile.  It is me who reaches out, my arm around the little waist, to pull her into the mold of me.  

8/02

Oh, how far we’ve come.

Amen.