Dreaming

Dark gray x’s across the boxes. Graphite smudges, numbers illegible, blurred letters underneath. I started about a month ago, this ritual, this marking off the passage of time.

When I worked seasonal jobs on boats, jobs that consisted of 16-hour workdays, no time to myself other than the occasional dip in the ocean while guests drank cocktails on deck, me sneaking back to the galley in my sopping bikini, tying a sarong over my salty body to slice up fresh ahi, I’d put a line through the days on my planner. Each day closer to having my life back, closer to a big paycheck and the freedom to use it whenever and wherever I wanted, usually on a trip to visit friends in New York or Belgium or LA. Even after a sunset swim in the Caribbean Sea and cooking and sailing for a living, it was difficult for me to fully embrace the present. I always longed for something more.

My life is still seasonal, but not in the same way. I am (relatively) permanently installed on a farm on an island with my family: a husband, two small kids, my mother-in-law and other extended family nearby. We have animals that need tending every day, a garden that must be weeded and planted and watered, a house that must be cleaned and fixed and heated. My kids go to school many days of the week, I work part-time as a chef, my husband shears sheep and tends the livestock and soil. The fullness of our life cannot be contained in a box on the calendar, but I try.

The kids like it when I cross off the days so they can see exactly which day is today. Or at least my five-year-old does. The two-year-old doesn’t yet have a concept of days; if we say we are going to the park tomorrow she rushes to put on her boots and cries when I pull them off, promising tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow.

But I know what days are, what weeks are. Months, years. And very unlike my pre-kids-self, my family-self pretty much knows where I will be each day, week, month. Maybe not each year, quite yet, but I think that is more wishful thinking than reality: most likely we will be right here, not traveling the world with rucksacks, not living in Mexico searching for whales, not sailing to Hawaii.

So for now, I get satisfaction scheduling events, writing down the details of dance classes and birthday parties, solstice celebrations and summer camp. A full calendar feels like an accomplishment of sorts and so does crossing each fully booked day off.

Yet, I feel anxious. I am crossing off days leading to what? There is no freedom from kids except in small spurts. There is no endpoint to parenting, nor do I want there to be.

This is my midlife crisis, I am realizing. My life pre-kids was so seasonally driven, goal driven, gig driven. The longest job I ever had in my twenties and thirties was three years. The longest I stayed in one place was less than that (if you don’t count living on a boat as one place). I have lived on this island for over seven years now, on this farm for six. My daughter is just about five. I have not been away from this piece of land for longer than ten days in the past six years. I have not been away from my kids for longer than five days.

All these numbers, all this counting, comparing. It is sinking me.

My midlife crisis is materializing, demanding for me to have a goal, pushing me to look at my shadowy parts that must have adventure on the horizon or feel trapped.

This became apparent yesterday when I found a rowing wherry on craigslist and imagined myself in it, knew I must have it, subsequently found it was sold. When I told my husband about the progression, the disappointment, he laughed a little and said I couldn’t get another boat until I got rid of my old, rarely used kayak. I burst into tears, rage building beneath. Instantly I built a case against him, against my kids, our farm, our life, in my head, simultaneously mourning the freedom I once knew. I would never trade my present life for my past, knowing full well I was as unhappy much of the time without kids, without a partner and a solid home, but in moments when dreams feel impossible, there is a flicker in my mind considering escape.

I sobbed to my husband, leaning against the kitchen door frame, that I needed a dream, multiple dreams, goals, adventure. The sold wherry was symbolizing a small dream and felt literally tangible, at least for a moment. Even if my visions of living in Mexico for a few months out of the year or trekking around the desert with the kids or meeting up with another family in Spain to do a farm stay, even if none of these actually happen, they could and I need to dream that they will. Or I need a small boat to float upon, utterly calm and content in my element, a vessel on which to stare out at the vast horizon, “Someday” on my lips.

I need a carrot. Is this wrong?

Is this evading the present, the sacred mundane, the joys of small children moment to moment? Yes and no. I appreciate the need to enjoy the now, but I also need promise of more later. A shred of my old life, a burst of color in an otherwise mostly green palate. Green for grass and trees and lettuce leaves. I miss the turquoise water and brilliant red sunsets and purple sunrises and rainbow of a parrotfish.

My younger daughter has just learned how to say “I miss _______” and i wonder if I have done her a disservice by teaching her this phrase. Can we quell longing by appreciating instead of missing?

I don’t know. I appreciate the adventures I’ve had and all the friends I’ve made but that doesn’t make absolve me from craving travel and connection.

So for now, until I know otherwise, I will plan. I will dream. I will scribble notes on the calendar that include far off places and friends and crazy adventures. I will dream and teach my kids to dream. Or just let them; isn’t that what kids naturally do? So instead of my anchors, they can be my balloons: we can float through fantasy and let it merge with reality and tell our stories as we go, one box on the calendar at a time.

What I Haven't Written About

A hand over my mouth. No a mask. A mask covered with flowers. Then an austere gray one, a practical little black dress black one. I don’t speak as clearly behind a mask. I am not heard as well. Others cannot see my smile, something I have always gotten complimented on, my teeth once shiny white now tea stained, receding gums hidden behind my lips but still a big infectious smile, my laugh more of a guffaw than a laugh. Someone once asked me if my laugh annoyed others. Those that I love say they love my loud, distinctive bray, now quieted behind fabric. Yes, I used the word bray.

My lips have changed over the years. The pink has softened to a muted rose; nothing a little tinted lip gloss can’t help. The outline has become less distinct, little lines marching along the perimeter, drying out in the winter cold or summer heat, perfect in the dampness of spring. A little black spot appeared on my lower lip a year or two ago. Not cancer. I got it checked out. Hormones? Or all those years in the sun forgetting to wear sunblock, lips puffy with burn?

Lips that kiss my daughters’ soft hair, their soft little hands. Even when wearing a mask.

I am propped up on the couch, my immune system screaming WTF. Second shot yesterday, wanting to feel good about the decision, wanting my Mom to meet my now one-year-old daughter she’s only seen online, read to our four-year-old in person, brushing hair out of her eyes, snuggling on the couch. I am achy and sore and my lips tremble when I cry. My four year old wraps her arms around me (Softly, sweetie, Mommy is hurting) and brings me tea and pretend food to help me feel better. I bring the wooden pieces of bread and meat up to my lips, force a smile, pretend to eat, to feel nourished.

And I am. Nourished. By this little being who has bright blue eyes, unlike me, and freckles forming on her nose, just like me. By the other little one whose eyes are deep brown, a darker shade of mine, whose lips curl into smiles with each assisted step across the floor. Unmasked joy on her face.

The masks have been hard. This year has been hard. All the choices have been hard.

And here we are.

And here we are.

And here we are.

The days and nights are long; the weeks, months, years are short

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,

To the last syllable of recorded time.

My daughter wouldn’t tell me what she was scared of when I crawled into her bed in the middle of the night.

I’m scared, Mommy.

Why, honey?

I don’t want to tell you.

Maybe I can help?

Stay with me in case it happens again.

What, sweetie? What happened?

I don’t want to tell you.

OK, sweetie. Try to go back to sleep, OK? I said as I curled myself around her warm body. I wanted to sleep, too. I wanted to ignore the mewling baby in her crib in the bedroom on the opposite end of the tiny second floor our house, (actually my office, actually her temporary bedroom I remind myself as I type, sodden diapers still on the floor after 12am and 3am diaper changes, do you have to poop sweetie, why the hell aren’t you sleeping, are you sure you don’t have to pee? I ask as I sit her little butt on a plastic potty next to my desk.)

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out out brief candle!

Her wall was on fire. She woke to her wall on fire. This is what my three-year-old told my husband the next night. This is why she was scared, this is why she needed to crawl into my bed after I crawled out of hers, toss and turn next to me until we both thankfully fell asleep at which point her sister woke once again and I cursed under my breath and blinked my eyes into the darkness, the moon shining through a break in the curtain making me think a light was on in the hall which meant my husband might be up which meant it was thankfully morning but it was not; it was just the moon. I lugged myself out of bed next to my now sleeping toddler (please don’t wake up, please don’t wake up), picked up my sitting-up-wailing nine-month-old from the crib, stumbled over a stack of research books and magazines (its my office, its my office, its my office) and sat down in the wingchair, pulled a boob from my shirt, winced slightly at a little mouth with sharp teeth latching on.

The wingchair was my first purchase when I got to the island. It was $15 dollars at the thrift store, curved wooden legs, golden brocade with dusty pink and green foliage. I sat next to the small propane fire in my small studio reading book after book, journaling, drinking tea in the quiet of the afternoon after long walks through the woods. At night I might meditate or read some more or phone a friend, legs hanging over the curved arms. Or I’d sit staring at the wall where dozens of post-its conveyed the touchpoints of the memoir I was working on for hours each day. A memoir that decided it was a healing process and not ready to present itself to the world. A hundred thousand words of healing and learning how to write, how to finish something. So much time in chairs, so much time in silence or listening to music that wasn’t Frozen, so much time doing whatever the hell I wanted.

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, 

And then is heard no more.

She was quiet, the baby in my arms. Or mostly; her little mouth made those newborn-y suckling sounds even though she wasn’t a newborn anymore but she was still my nursing, oh so dependent baby. A car headlight shone through the layers of curtains, cast a shadow on her tiny face. What is a person doing driving so late at night, I thought. It seems ridiculous to me that so many years ago I was able to stay up until 3am, wake at 7am, go to classes all day, see friends and lovers and shows and music, create, read, study, shower. Day after day. Maybe sleep in on the weekends. Yes, that is youth. Yes, I miss having that much energy. Yet, even with sleep deprivation deepening the dark circles under my eyes and clouding my thoughts, I am doing OK. I may not be wandering the streets of New York City at 2am anymore, smoking bidis, sober and reciting verse or drunk and peeing next to a shuttered shoe store on 14th Street, skirt hiked up to my hips and giggling, ignoring the business men stumbling by, but that is a blessing. Now I am up at 3am, totally sober and smokeless, studying the gentle curve of my baby’s lips against my skin.

Yesterday I sat alone in the car (an anomaly) listening to a segment on NPR about the musical RENT, which opened 25 years ago January. I saw the musical during my first week at NYU. Blocked out seats for all us freshmen one sticky August night. I was enamored with the show, not just the lore behind the scenes, but the idea of being edgy, reckless, devoted to one’s art amidst urban decay, giving a middle finger to the Man.

La vie boheme!

When I was 18, I had the story that I would be an actress, that I would be famous, that I would never be just a wife in the suburbs. I railed against the status quo, read the Communist papers, wore thrift store clothes, drank the cheapest of drinks at dive bars in the East Village. In reality I was a privileged white kid whose parents paid for private university, room, and board. I thankfully wasn’t a junkie or forced to squat in decrepit apartment buildings.

Still, I had dreams of an artistic life. I wonder what my 18-year-old self would make of me now: wife and mother, living on a farm? Or what about my 21-year-old self who returned to NY to finish her degree after traveling through India to find herself and realized what a privileged a-hole she was but who still wanted to make art? Or my 25-year-old self who sailed from San Diego to NYC via Panama on a 32-foot boat and started writing about it on a laptop strapped down to the table down below? Would she have shuddered at the thought of such mundane days and nights with a baby clamped on a boob or a finger painting with a toddler?

It is a tale told by an idiot,

Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

The story has changed. I have changed. I still want to share my art but the art is different now, informed by decades of wandering, adventure, regrets. Now it is informed by literal and emotional grounding: living on a farm, soil perpetually stuck under my fingernail. Being present with two small children day after day. The fallow joys of being in one place for years instead of just days or weeks or months. My home is filled with music: my husband’s favorite post rock as he cleans the dishes after another nourishing meal from our land. Disney soundtracks and my three-year-old singing at the top of her lungs wearing multiple layers of dresses, insisting on intricate braids in her hair imitating her favorite characters. Let it go, let it go, can’t hold it back anymore! Occassionally I’ll get to play my records on the record player. Homeward Bound by Simon and Garfunkel, the record I used to play while sitting on the windowsill of my dorm room, staring out at the city, wondering what home could actually look like.

Now I know. 

In the middle of the night, for stretches, it is quiet. I sleep. I dream. I wake up with a heart on fire.

Also published on Medium.com

Short Story Written on November 4th, 2020

She let her head rest on the table, her spine curved like a scimitar. The chair wasn’t comfortable. It was hard, cold, wobbly under her body. Unstable. The coffee in front of her called and her hands reached for it, wrapped around it, fingers interlaced. She pulled the ceramic mug closer to her body, to the place where her ribs met and fused, the place just outside of her heart. Kayla studied the mug from above, the two round ears and pointed noise, the black body and red pants, all upside down from her view. The mug was an uncomfortable joke. She hated Disneyland, hated everything it stood for: consumerism, gluttony, privilege, the fantasy of peace in that annoying “it’s a small world after all” ride. When she was little, she didn’t hate Disneyland. She wore her Mickey Mouse ears with religious fervor, was pissed when a babysitter threw her into the pool with her ears on. Kayla’s mom threw the little hat with plastic ears in the drier to soothe a furious Kayla. She pulled out the transformed hat: ears deformed, the felt crumpled tight. Kayla stared blankly in the mirror, the hat an upside down cup of anxiety on her head. She threw it across the room, wouldn’t pick it up, wouldn’t look at it. Her mom secreted it to the trashbin when Kayla stormed out of the room. Annual passholders, her mom took her to the Magic Kingdom the following weekend, offered to buy her another set of ears. Kayla chose a giant swirly lollipop and Little Mermaid doll instead.

When the door opened Kayla lifted her head but didn’t turn her face. She brought the mug to her lips, took a sip. The coffee inside the mug was cold. She took another sip, set it down, stared out the window.

How’s it looking, Adam?

Shitty. Just fucking shitty.

That bad?

That close.

Ugh. People are idiots. Right? They’re just stupid, right?

Misinformed. Misguided by Fox, the internet, QAnon bullshit. And some are idiots, for sure.

Adam sat down in the hard, cold, wobbly chair across from Kayla and put his phone down on the oiled wood. He reached across the table and peeled a hand off her mug revealing Mickey’s manic smile. Her hand was so warm in his cold one.

We’re going to be OK, right?

He shifted his gaze from her face to the table, to the clock above the stove, to the window. Felice, their tabby cat, sauntered in from the living room, yawned and wound her way from ankle to ankle to ankle to ankle.

Kayla blew air out of her mouth. Her body curved again, her chest against the table, one hand still gripping the mug.

Just tell me we’re going to be OK. Just lie or whatever. I mean, I know you don’t know. I know you think there’s going to be a fucking civil war or at the very least violent protests, National Guard deployment, scary shit. But just tell me we’re going to be OK. Please?

We are OK in this moment, Kayla. We just have to wait and see about the rest.

You know I’m really bad at waiting. Can you just check the thingy again? See if it’s changed? Kayla reached for Adam’s phone. In one motion he slid the phone off the table, stood up, put it in his back pocket, and continued to hold her hand.

Let’s go for a walk.

Kayla leaned back against his pull, scrunched up her face.

I don’t think we should go outside.

Are you serious? We live on a dirt road. Nobody comes up here.

Except for truck guy. Flag truck guy.

We haven’t seen him in weeks.

Yeah, but he knows where we live. He knows we support the other side. We have a BLM sign, that’s all he needs, even if it’s hung on a kids wagon. Maybe he’ll think we have kids but maybe he doesn’t care even if we did. Didn’t you read about that guy in Quebec with the sword? He killed like three people.

Wait, wait, what? Kayla, that wasn’t even election related.

You don’t know that.

It was in Canada, Kayla. Canadians don’t give a shit about the circus down here.

You don’t know that.

Holy shit, girl, we need to get out of here. Let’s go for a walk. I know for sure that nature doesn’t give a shit about the election. The deer don’t care. The raccoons could care less. The grass will grow and the trees will lose their leaves no matter who wins.

Actually…

No, don’t say it. I know the idiot wants to cut down the old growth and pave over the grass. He pulled her to the door. Just stop, OK, just for a little bit. We’re OK, we’re alive, lets move these legs and…

(sound of engine revving, flag flapping, then metal clanking, crashing. A horn honks to the tune of ‘A shave and a haircut’ but stops short of the last phrase. A minute of silence. A thud on the door.)

Kayla and Adam stand frozen next to the door.

Fuck fuck fuck, Kayla shook. Don’t answer it!

It wasn’t a knock, Kayla. It was...something. A tomato maybe? Really truck guy? His voice shook.

Tomatoes aren’t in season!

Oh my god, Kayla. There’s a store on the island, remember? I can’t believe we’re saying this. He moved towards the door.

Don’t open it! She tried to back away from the door, tried to pull his arm, but Adam barely strained against her, shook his arm out of hers.

I just want to see. Maybe it was the newspaper.

It didn’t sound like a newspaper. And at 10am? That’s never happened. Just, please, don’t, OK?

Hand on the doorknob, another hand on the doorframe, back to Kayla’s crumpling face, he slowly opened the heavy wooden door.

Garden Stuffed Salmon

I backed up on the sand, heart racing, shimmering line in front of me taut, my knuckles white around the reel. “Back up, back up!” my friend Pip called, even though I could barely hear anything as I focused solely on the thrashing salmon in the water.  Thrashing, then gone. I’d lost it. My first hooked salmon of the season, my first hooked salmon ever or since. Gone.

“No worries. It happens to us all,” I think Pip said.

Then her rod bent towards the sea and she reeled and backed her boots out of the water and onto the sand where soon a gorgeous salmon lay flipping at her feet. (Or at least this is how it oh-so-elegantly happened in my head.)

I wanted to blame it on the barbless hook (required here on Puget Sound so that you don’t damage the wild salmon you must release) or the rod or my tired arms but it didn’t matter; dinner was gone. I’ve been fishing a couple of times since but haven’t even gotten a nibble. I’d like to think that whatever fish we don’t catch the Orcas are eating. We weren’t trying to catch the kind the Southern Resident Orcas eat (King/Chinook), but details, details.

One day I hope to catch a salmon off the shores of this island. In the meantime, I buy salmon from Cape Cleare Fishery in Port Townsend because they actually know what they’re doing and they do it well. They catch the fish in Alaska with poles and lines, which is the most sustainable way to go. I order 10 pounds at a time and a cheerful and very fit woman named Pamela bikes several coolers over on the ferry to Whidbey. How cool (and oh so crunchy) is that?

It is also the best tasting salmon I’ve ever had. This time I got a whole Coho Salmon to feed the family. I harvested veggies and herbs from the garden and baked it all up. Here’s how it went:

 I thinly sliced half an onion and a fennel bulb on a mandolin. I chopped a couple cloves of garlic and a couple of peppers along with a handful of sage, parsley and thyme. The sliced lemon was the only thing not from our garden.

Salmon from Cape Cleare

Here’s the whole four pound fish. They delivered it without a head so if you’re a fan of sucking down fish eyeballs, too bad.

Pour a bit of olive oil into the cavity and on the skin. Sprinkle all with salt and pepper.

Stuff salmon with lemons, fennel, onions, peppers, and herbs.

Tie up the fish with cooking twine.

I had some extra fennel and onions so I surrounded the fish with the veggies to crisp em up.

Cook it all at 425 degrees for about 40 minutes, depending on the size of the fish.

Snip off the twine, surround it with the fennel fronds, and serve it up.

We roasted up some carrots and made a kale Caesar and green bean and beet salad to round out the meal.

Rye's Up

We planted rye in the late winter when the rain pummeled the cold ground. The tiny seeds germinated as the track of the sun slowly crept further north with each passing day, my belly shadow growing larger on warming earth. Little seeds sent roots into the ground and tender shoots towards the gray sky while you practiced breathing fluid into lungs and opening ocean gray eyes. You were born in the spring of a pandemic, but neither you nor the rye seemed to notice.

Now you, Fiona Rye, and I brush our bodies through the tall grass together, your small head on my shoulder, eyes shut tight against the summer sun. I enclose your softly breathing body in my arms and watch the field undulate a fiery rust and dull gold in the gusts of wind. The field is an ocean, waves sending energy across the curvature we stand upon. The field is on fire, vegetal flames bending and shaking towards soil and sky.

Fire like the fires that burned in the streets of nearby Seattle and so many other cities across the country. Fires I felt so torn about at first: how was destruction and violence honoring a dead man? This was the first thought I had as a privileged white woman who cannot even begin to comprehend the anger and frustration felt by so many. (I do not think a bunch of white kids looting The Gap is representative of the justified anger I am talking about. That is just taking advantage of a situation.) There is so much real, justifiable, potent anger; not just about George Floyd but about living in constant fear and desperation. About the deep disparities in this riven country. About feeling powerless and unheard and sick and tired of meaningless talk. I am answered with more questions in the smoky wind blowing over my rural home: how can we rebuild our society if it is not burnt to the ground in some way or another?  

After weeks of largely peaceful protests (which I have not attended but supported from afar, you, my newborn raising tiny fists into the air) the media has gone largely silent, focusing once again on surges of COVID-19 and Trump’s tax returns. I want to believe that the world is still on fire. Not physically but psychologically. That the momentum will not stop and this is the burning to the ground of the old ways. We can do it metaphorically and psychologically, not just physically, to make a lasting impact. I want to believe that with our voices and physical bodies we are enacting change. That enough bodies will make a difference. Bodies are such an important part of the equation; they are, and always have been, the main source of contention, of value, of what we perceive as difference.

You squirm and burp and spit up on my shoulder as I pat your back. We wade through the fiery field and circle around the perimeter of our farm. Up at the top of the hill we can see the Olympic Mountains and a tiny sliver of the silvery Sound. Down the hill we pass the pigs we will harvest for chops and bacon and ham. We pass the chicken huts where dozens of meat birds scratch thought the grass for insects. We pass the goats that turn the blackberry leaves and grass they eat into fresh milk we pour into our coffee or into our older daughter’s cup. Close to the barn the hens peck and cluck and I wonder if there is a secret nest of orange-yolked eggs among the stacked bales of hay. The plum and apple trees boast tiny globes of fruit in varying degrees. The grass is clipped short near the garden. Beds erupt with beets and carrots, pea vines, potato plants, garlic, onions, lettuce, kale and an assortment of berries. We are fed and clothed and safe.

You, Fiona Rye, were born on the living room floor. When the masked midwife asked if I wanted to reach down and touch your head in the middle of pushing you through the birth canal, I said, “No, I just want her out!” I knew I’d have plenty of time to stroke your dark hair in coming days, weeks, months but that’s not the reason I said that; after two nights and one day of intense labor (screaming, moaning, grunting) I was ready to be done with contractions and near constant pain and wondering how so many (mothers and others) could endure so much suffering.

Your dad might say at one point or another, seriously or sarcastically, that Life is Suffering. We’ve both dabbled in Buddhist philosophy and this is one of the main concepts. It doesn’t mean that we need to be miserable all the time. You and your sister are probably better teachers about that than I am with your present-mindedness, your storms of crying and infectious laughter, all energy passing through. But I wonder what the world will be like in terms of tangible human suffering when you are old enough to empathize, to harbor regrets and doubts, to be aware of your biases, to hurt or heal others. Maybe you are aware already. Maybe you already think and do and say things you wish you hadn’t. If you don’t, you will. Or maybe you will grow up in a world that has changed enough fundamentally to mitigate the damage humans do to one another. I hope that we can raise you in a way that you see humans as humans in all their varying shapes and shades. I hope we can raise you to be not just aware but passionate about every single person’s right to dignity and respect and health.

You were born in a time of pandemic and national protests. You were born in a time when the skies cleared and animals took back their home territories and more of the population realized that precious food can be a scarcity. You were born in a time when people of color were (are) being murdered without repercussion and voices are rising up louder and louder against the injustice. This is why I have hope amidst the shouting through masks. I believe you chose to be born into this time of upheaval and change. Of burning (instead of burying) the old ways so that we do not have to unearth them from the core again.

Let the ashes cloud the sky. When they fall to the ground they will fertilize the soil for new growth. May you tend the seeds.

Waiting with the Dogwood

The man at the garden store looks down at the crumpling brown leaf I hold in my palm. “Sunburn,” he says. I sigh with relief. “It’s going to get ugly as the summer goes on,” he says, “but it’ll probably live. I’d leave it where it is this year. Next winter, move it to a shadier spot.” My heart drops. Move it? I can’t just move the tree. He wouldn’t understand. Maybe we could cover the tree with shadecloth or make sure to water it more, de-scorch the leaves with hydration or something? “There’s nothing else to do?” I ask. “Nope. Dogwoods do better in partial shade.” Shit. OK. What we had thought of as the perfect spot for a tree to commemorate our far-too-early-born child, the tiny embryonic culmination of the two of us buried under the roots, was not a perfect spot at all. It was possibly fatal for the tree. How did we not know this?

I leave the store unsure of how to proceed. I sadly explain the situation to my husband when he gets home and he simply says, “Misplanting of a miscarriage.” He shrugs his shoulders and gives me that sensible look of his that simultaneously pisses me off and makes me appreciate him for his lack of sentimentality or superstition. I mean, I’m thinking, “What could this possibly mean?” Spiritually, you know? I don’t ask him that because he’d probably roll his eyes. Instead I try to put aside my emotional attachment and say what I know he would say, “Well, I guess if the tree dies of sun exposure that’s a lot worse than moving it. Them. Both of them. We’ll try to move both of them.”

He looks into my eyes and softens. We remember the winter day when we waited for the miscarriage to happen, when I squealed with surprise as I walked towards the dug out hole where the dogwood would go, how I felt the amniotic sac and placenta push through the gates of my body, how we marveled at the intact beginnings and endings in my palm. How we lay the could-have-beens in the soil and covered them with compost, covered them with the sprawling young roots of a tree whose flowers would reach their faces skyward.

The dogwood budded out in early spring, seemed to be thriving as the days grew warmer, as lilacs bloomed like they did the week our daughter was born, as grass sprouted in the back field of our farm. The young tree’s leaves unfurled and opened themselves to the lengthening days of sun. I touched each pale green and yellowish-white leaf with wonder and joy. Life can spring from death. Dramatic, yes, but oh so true.

When I first noticed the curling brown edges despite consistent watering and care, I thought it might be a sign of some sort; that somehow I couldn’t care for the unborn one even after their burial. Or maybe it was a sign about my fertility: withering leaves, withering eggs?

Every month since February, my emotional life has been orchestrated by my cycle. Not in the stereotypical watch-out-I-have-PMS way. Obsessive tracking on two apps about my cervical fluid and predicted days of ovulation. Trying to time the sex, trying to make it sexy instead of dutiful, trying not to get up too quickly afterwards, wondering if I should lift my hips to help the swimmers slide on in when I could hardly keep my exhausted body from falling into a deep sleep. Not able to sleep thinking of all the things I had to do that hadn’t been done yet because my two-year-old simply wouldn’t listen or cooperate while I tried to vacuum or weed the garden or have a two-minute phone call to the bank and why the hell do we think having another child is a good idea.

Waiting. Buying multi-packs of pregnancy tests. Hoping that what feels like cramps aren’t really cramps but simply a sore back from picking up my thirty-two-pound toddler or somehow the beginnings of the lower back pain or loose joints associated with pregnancy. Thinking the pregnancy test might not be accurate. Hoping that the blood on the toilet paper is implantation not period. Admitting two days into a heavy flow that it is definitely a period. Admitting that a baby will not be born in nine months. Panicking that another month has gone by not pregnant and another month brings me closer to turning 42-years-OLD and you know what they say about shriveled up eggs and birth defects and early menopause.

I didn’t think I would be “that woman.” That woman desperate to get pregnant.

We got pregnant so quickly three years ago. I got home from a long distance sailing race to Alaska and was finally ready at 38-years-old to go for the whole family thing. Less than two months later, I was knocked up and ecstatic. My pregnancy was uneventful and beautiful except for a few months of constant low-grade nausea. Seasickness from the ocean inside. Months of women approaching me in public to share pregnancy tips and birth stories. Or just huge smiles and congratulations. Like I’d done something right.

We started trying last summer and were surprised it took us six months to get pregnant. The miscarriage happened only seven weeks in. Was our first healthy pregnancy simply a fluke? Did I drink too much tea or not take enough vitamin C or am I too old to support another baby? What am I doing wrong this time around?
All the doctors say I am healthy, that I have a younger body than my years, that all the systems seem in order. I’m taking all the freaking supplements, eating all the right foods, my husband is a lot younger than me with (presumably) healthy sperm. “How is this not happening?” I ask every month I stare down at the unwelcomed blood.

I have to say here that there is a bit of relief, too, the three cycles I've found out I wasn't pregnant. I know. I know! The ambiguity about having a second child is surprising to me, too. It's confusing. How can I want this baby so bad and also feel relief at not having to go through the process: the fatigue, anxiety-producing genetic testing, morning sickness, and lack of control that is pregnancy. All the uncertainty about who the baby will be or who I will be as a parent to them. Wondering how the hell I could love them as much as I do my little girl. Wondering if having another one is fair considering the catastrophic imminent displacement and suffering of millions with climate change.

Is this ambiguity the problem? Maybe the little souls who may be hovering sense my hesitation and therefore hesitate themselves, aren't sure if they're welcome. Of course you're welcome, little one! Just as long as you're perfect, OK? Just kidding. I mean kind of.

I want to trust the universe and all that. And I want to be OK with just having one child if that is how it turns out. I want to stay open to all the possibilities.

And it’s hard. To wait. To trust. To believe it is all for the best, not simply a punishment for some unknown violation. To figure out if this is love or ego driven (I said I would do it, therefore I must). Yet, as I've learned in the three years since I got pregnant the first time, I can’t really ‘figure out’ much when it comes to birthing and parenting, I just have to take some sort of action and see what happens.

The dogwood tree is a ghost in our yard. Wisps of white garden fabric float sideways in the breeze, the majority tied to the wire fence guarding the tree from deer and goats. The sun-damaged fabric that has protected carrots for several seasons now offers glimpses of the sunburnt leaves of the tree, the thin, slightly crooked trunk, the branches up-stretched to the wisps of clouds floating by. I whisper to the tree: I will protect you. I will move you if we need to. I will do what it takes to honor the needs of the living. I say this to the tree and to the one who was born in a tiny golden orb the size of a cherry. I say this to my daughter and to any souls hovering about my womb waiting for a sign to jump on in. I’m not sure, I’ll never be sure, but I want this anyway.

I water the roots of the tree under the downy layer of wool we used for mulch. I tie the fabric back onto the fence where it has pulled away. I wait.

That’s all I can do.

That’s all I can do.