Unfinished post: Poetry Reading

I first wrote this post for the Lighthouse blog, back in November, but ultimately decided it was too personal to share on a more public site. I was reminded of it tonight for two reasons. First, a work event I attended included a the lovely poet Lynn Wagner reading from her work, No Blues This Raucous Song, and the post is about feeling affected by a poetry reading. Second, when my GPS system had "trouble acquiring satellites" on my home from Denver, and I wasn't sure how to find my way out of town, I was reminded, yet again, that we're new here, and I think this post is also about wishing for familiarity.

I honestly thought I had posted this before, but a search of the blog turns up nothing. This is a minor miracle tonight, when I am very tired and would be hard pressed to truly post anew. So, here it is (excuse the formatting, it's a result of the cut and paste):

>Listening to John Brehm read from his collections tonight, I was reminded what it was to be 13, copying poems from the pages of Sassy magazine into a notebook: finally, someone had gotten it just right, found the exact words to express things I had felt.

True, Brehm's work recalled some of my own experiences: like him, I lived in Brooklyn for twelve years before moving to Boulder; lived there happily for a decade, then not. Like him, spent the final years jangling from the noise and complexity and the just plain hardness of it all. I saw myself in his poems: I have been to that social security office, though my bad encounter had to do with throwing out my lunch because it was not allowed through security. I have stood on that corner of Park and 17^th, looking up, only I was looking for The Avalon, the restaurant where my college roommate had cocktail waitressed. It was a pleasure to remember the way that poetry can transport you to another time and place.

But of course, the power of poetry is also its ability to cut you to the quick, and quickly.

While these New York scenes made me feel something familiar- nostalgia, maybe, something backwards-looking, it was the universal evoked in his work that offered a familiarity that somehow looks forward. Like this:

from Sea of Faith

(In this poem, a freshman student has asked whether the Sea of Faith in the poem Dover Beach is “a real sea”)

I tried to explain in such a way

as to protect her from humiliation,

tried to explain that poets

often speak of things that don't exist.

It was only much later that I wished

I could have answered differently,

only after I'd betrayed myself

and been betrayed that I wished

it was true, wished there really were a Sea of Faith

that you could wade out into,

dive under its blue and magic waters,

hold your breath, swim like a fish

down to the bottom, and then emerge again

able to believe in everything, faithful

and unafraid to ask even the simplest of questions,

happy to have them simply answered.

Yes, yes, I thought, and turned my face in the bright room where the reading was held, to conceal the fact that I was crying.

I felt the wave rising in me, the journey I was being taken on, and I thought, maybe if I try not to listen too hard, if I listen softly, like watching through my fingers, maybe I can quell the tears.

When I got home, I sat my husband down and read him this poem. But when I got to those last lines and felt the wave again, this time, in private, I rode it. My voice quavered as I finished the poem, and I didn’t bother to collect myself.

And Dave, my husband, smiled.

Easter Dresses

The other day I popped in to Home Good/ TJ Maxx on my home from work, to return a duvet cover that didn't work for Clio's bed. I wandered into the girls section to see if they had dance gear in Clio's size, and (cue that heavenly music, where the sun rises and birds chirp and bunnies hop by): the Easter Dresses are here.

Oh. My. God.

I wished I had my camera on me to capture the display (perhaps the whole post-a-day thing is getting to me). As any bargain-stor shopper knows, most of the racks at a TJ Maxx are close together and stuffed- they have great stuff, but they make you work for it. But right now, they have cleared a tremendous amount of square footage for a real display: little islands of clothing racks, each festooned with two or three styles of dress in sizes from baby to big girl. Because Clio mostly wears dresses anyway (and has a particular fondness for fancy dresses), I felt justified in making a selection,and found myself loaded down with frothy confections for her spring/summer wardrobe. But because Clio is also quite opinionated about her fashions, and because my mother does an excellent job of picking out special occasion dresses, I put all but two back, and these two are sundresses as much as they are party dresses.


I'll give you a minute to absorb the cuteness.

Go ahead, enjoy it.....

Okay, moving on. While shopping, I noticed another trend in little-girls clothing: the big-girls clothes in little girl sizes. Embellished denim minis, funky hoodies, sassy slogans, lace-edged leggings. At first glance, there is something adorable about trendy teen clothing in toddler sizes, but upon second thought, I found myself drawn back to the high waists, the full skirts, the puff sleeves, the sashes. My little girls will only be little once; there is plenty of time to dress like teenagers- hopefully, just when they are teenagers. So I will indulge Clio's princess fantasy with a little one of my own.

I haven't revealed the dresses to Clio yet- I need to wait long enough that I might actually let her wear one of them once she sees them, but not so long that I can't return them if, inexplicably, she hates them.

For now, it is giving me great pleasure just to look at them.


And take their picture.

On Montessori

Tonight we attended Parent Visiting night at Clio's school for the second time, an event where the children choose work to demonstrate for their parents. Clio's list, written on a clover cutout that she had colored green, included:

1. Metal Cutouts
2. Spindle Box
3. Color tablets
4. Plant polish

What she showed us was:

1. Watercolors
2. Trinomial Cube
3. Color Tablets
4. Metal cutouts
5. Plant polish

right there, you learn something about Montessori: we trust the child, and allow them choice within a prepared environment.

Earlier this week, a very tired Clio threw an absolute fit in the morning, refusing to go to school. There was nothing she liked to do there, she claimed. I asked her if she did painting at school, an activity that she never tires of at home, and she revealed to me that she had not yet had a lesson in painting. Montessori work is based in precise practice, with a number of practical steps building to the completion of a project. Painting does not mean sitting at a table where an adult has laid out paper, paints, and water--no lesson required. It means selecting the work, carrying it to a table, taking a small glass vial to the sink to fill with water,carrying the vessel back to the table, careful not to spill, pouring that water into a shallow vessel, going to another shelf to get a piece of paper, setting the paper on the tray, pulling out your chair, preparing the brush, and painting. Clean up is even more elaborate, and the work is complete when everything is clean, the material is back on its shelf, the child's chair is pushed in, a pencil is retrieved, the back of the work is signed, and the completed work is hung to dry. On that very crabby morning, I suggested to Clio that she ask her teacher for a lesson in watercolors. Apparently she did ask, and did get the lesson, and now there is something she can do at school that she always enjoys, and her sense of independence is validated.

I also believe that Clio was empowered by this experience of agency in directing her education. With each work tonight, Clio wanted to give us a lesson, and with the trinomial cube, she did. She demonstrated each of the steps to me, with verbal explanations and exaggerated motions: carrying the box and felt pad to the table. Unfolding the pad. Lifting the box onto the pad--with two hands, she specified. She continued: "take the top off. open this side, then this side. Put the top here." She took all of the pieces out of this 3-dimensional puzzle, laying each layer to one side of her work, then proceeded to put them back in--perfectly.


Now you do it, she said. And I did, getting reprimanded any time I lazily took two pieces out at once (one at a time, mom!) and praised when I followed her directions (good job, mom. very good.) And as I built the cube back up again, I slowed down and placed each piece deliberately, aware of the hurried way I do things now, with an emphasis on finishing. And I just marveled at this 3 1/2 year old creature, truly teaching me how to experience this puzzle box, one block at a time.

Dancing Queens

1. I used to love to dance. When I was five, I was chosen with just a few other kids from my school to perform a rain dance on stage during a dance performance. As if it is just s dream, I have no idea where the performance was, or why there were local school children involved, or how many nights it went on, or whether my parents were in the audience, and where my brothers might have been. What I remember is that my mom made me a special, matching shirt and culotte outfit for the occasion. That there were beautiful women backstage dressed as elves and fairies, one painted completely a pale shimmering blue. And that, when it was our turn, we were set free from the wings to explode onto that stage with thunder and lightning, and that we ran and leapt with joy and fury, and then receded, trickled off the stage. I remember the lights and the energy and the feeling of being special up there, alone, somehow, in public.

2. I take my first real dance class at the age of eight, a tap class that meets once a week, with my neighbor Carrie. We perform at Sibley Senior High at the end of the year, on a stage that feels as large as a planet. I feel important wearing makeup. I think it is the costume- blue with white lace and a tall, ridiculous bonnet- that brings me back for more.


3. When I try out for the upper-level troupe at Esther Brindle dance theater, performing a routine that I have choreographed with Carrie, I choose to wear a half-leotard and midriff shirt, in the style of the day; because this is not regulation dance gear, I am disqualified. I am thirteen.

4. My parents are dancers. Country first, then ballroom. My dad and I went to a father-daughter dinner dance every year I was in High School, and foxtrotted at my wedding.

I wonder if I ever stood on his feet and danced that way as a little girl, the way girls do in commercials designed to make mothers cry. I think I have stood on Dave's feet that way, and Clio has, too.

5. At our wedding, the band sang our first-dance song at a different tempo than what we were used to. When the botched performance was over, we asked for a do-over. No, I asked for a do-over.


And we did it over.


Instead of feeling embarrassed by having to try it twice, as I expected, I was elated at getting it right, once.

6. When Clio was just six months old, I took her to a Showcase where my mom was performing. I haven't gotten to see her perform since, but her latest routine is on YouTube. I prefer watching her dance at weddings, just for fun. I know that dancing brings my mother joy, but I sense that performing is more complicated.


7. I demonstrate the five ballet positions to Clio, and I am surprised how quickly it comes back- both leg and arm positions; I had forgotten there were arm positions, until my arms floated from on to the next to the next. Clio pretends to copy me, but really just makes up her own positions, though she does watch me with rapt attention. She is going to her first class, and I want her to feel familiar. After that, it's up to her.

Forts

Snow fort, circa 1983


Play house, circa 2008


Pillow fort, circa 2010

One Outfit, Two Ways

Despite the fact that Eleri essentially has Clio's old wardrobe (with a few of her own items thrown in here and there), she is rarely caught in repeat outfist. I suppose because their personalities are so different, they just end up in different ensembles, kind of like that occasional feature in Lucky Magazine where the stylists bring a bunch of stuff to the street, grab passersby, and then photograph the different outfits they come up with using the same raw material.

That said, there is one outfit in the repertoire that just seems like it must go together, both two years ago and today: these hand-me-down red pants and this little navy striped "sailor" t-shirt. It was a favorite combo with Clio, and it is again now. Every time Eleri ends up in it, I mean to take a picture and dig up an old one of Clio wearing the same thing. And, at last, here it is.



I will admit, I kept chasing Eleri around with a toy phone yesterday, trying to "replicate" the photo for a more clear comparison, but, alas, Eleri has a mind of her own.

I'd also like to mention that my friend Rebecca, who is right there with me in this post-a-day-challenge, also did a side-by-side comparison of her kids at the same age today. Great minds?

Snow

Once upon a time, there was a girl who loved the snow. She grew up in Minnesota, where there was plenty. When snow fell in buckets, in sheets, she cheered the arrival of the snowplow for its work creating large drifts, perfect for forts, which she built with her neighbors right into the dark, until mothers all around the cul-de-sac called children home for dinner.

Once, on Halloween, she did a snow dance, and only felt a little bad when the children arrived for their candy, their costumes obliterated by snowsuits.

The little girl grew up, went east. At school in Switzerland, she had roommates from South America who had never seen the snow. The look on their faces during the first snowfall made the girl appreciate what she had taken for granted. She thought she would always remember that joy. Then, a dozen years in New York City began to turn her relationship to snow. In the city, snow was dirty and sometimes pee-stained and rarely closed down transportation, but often slowed it to a crawl. It was an inconvenience. Cars parked on the street were impossible to move for opposite-side parking regulations. When it melted, it made rivers, fjords at street corners that were nearly impassable. Once, though, the girl remembers Brooklyn under the cover of so much snow that it was muffled completely, peaceful; something she could not imagine if she had not experienced it on the streets alone, walking for blocks down the middle of the always-busy road with all the cars and buildings slumbering under their snow blankets around her.

The grown-up girl had girls of her own, and they moved to Boulder, where heavy snowfall begins in October and continues to May, and there are often days--like today--where the world is peaceful and muffled by snow as on that one dream-like day in Brooklyn. The snow is clean enough for the littlest one to eat (and she does.) And when the girl takes her own girls sledding for the first time, and they speed down the hill with their hands dragging out into the snow, and their cheeks flush, she can see the sparkle of joy again, just like the South Americans.

And she remembers that snow is beautiful.