Summer Singing

It is true that summer makes me sing.

Not in the shower, or with the radio.

More like sun singing, green and purple.

Moxie singing. Pesto songs.

Fiddle sounds flutter out of her window and into mine.

Trill. Skip. Moths and butterflies and ladybugs and birds.

And singing.

Bob and Poison Ivy

by Cole

**Note. This story includes drawings. I so want to scan all of the drawings, but for now, it's just the story. The comments regarding the drawings are made by me (unless in quotes).

Aside from a few spelling/punctuation corrections this is exactly how Cole wrote the story.

Cover

*Drawing. Bob saying, "It won't hurt," with all sorts of bumps protruding from his body.

Page 2

Bob was an ordinary man. He liked pizza and going on adventures and rainy days. He went into the woods and touched a leaf. He did not know it was poison ivy.

*Drawing. Bob saying, "It's just a leaf, right."

Page 3

Then Bob's finger started to itch. So Bob called the doctor but all the doctor said was that he should be on a liquid diet.

*Drawing. You should see Bob's face when the Dr. tells him to go on a liquid diet.

Page 4

So then he had to explain it to the doctor. But then he remembered that he was on a liquid diet. And that he ate a turkey for dinner last night.

*Drawing. Bob having lots of funny looks on his face.

Page 5

So Bob said that he ate a turkey. The doctor was so mad that he pulled his beard off and hung up. So Bob went on "Itch" dot com. Itch dot com showed bug itches, instalation (I'm not sure what this is) itches and last but not least plant itches. It showed a plant that was familiar to him; he also remembered he had touched it.

*Drawing. Bob sitting at his computer, straight-faced, visiting itch dot com.

Page 6

It said its name was poison ivy and if you were allergic to it you would have blisters and before you got blisters it would itch a lot lot lot.

Page 7

Well apparently he was allergic. His hand kept itching and it started to get wrinkly too.

*Drawing. Bob looks gigantic and very, very itchy.

Page 8

One week later a blister appeared. It looked green and ugly and it didn't itch anymore. But he didn't know how to get it off.

*Drawing. Four squares showing how Bob cannot get the blister off. Bob has an exclamation point over his head.

Page 9

Bob called the doctor again. He said he was on a liquid diet which made the doctor calmer. Bob talked to the doctor about the poison ivy. He said that it would go away in a week.

*Drawing. Bob on the phone with funny expressions on his face.

Page 10

In a week the bump went away. So Bob was up and running into trouble.

*Last drawing. Scanned for my personal viewing pleasure as I adore the ending to this story.

Kid Stuff

My children are in Maine with their grandparents and I am taking the time to go through the world's largest paper pile--paper accumulated over the past year--or maybe longer.

I am finding things that I have not seen before. Little sketches, stories, poems, pictures, notes. A year's worth of children being children.

A year's worth of pink kitty drawings.

I have been laughing out loud. And crying out loud. And doing other things out loud.

I have been invigorated, inspired, illuminated, awed, soured (like a pickle, not milk), surprised.

I am profoundly thankful for the teachers, friends, and humans interacting with my children; you are a gift.

My children are a gift and I am grateful.

Over the next few days I am going to try to post found things that I love. My favorites...and then I will shove everything into a folder or box or file or cabinet. I will freeze moments in time. I will let go and live.

Baby Learns to Crawl

A few days ago we noticed a loose tooth in Thea's mouth. Bottom right. A little wiggly.

Thea is four and has expressed great enthusiasm for having a wiggly tooth like her older brother and sister.

But four seems a little young for a wiggly tooth.

We went through all of the things that it could be:

1. Sucking two fingers, regularly.
2. A bump to the mouth.
3. Sibling rambunctiousness.
4. Alien abduction.
5. Pink Kitty (Pink Kitty gets blamed for a lot these days).

Of course it took us forever to realize that it might be that she is losing her first tooth.

Why would she lose a tooth? How could she lose a tooth?

MY BABY IS NOT LOSING A TOOTH!

A quick look behind the loose tooth revealed the cause: a big girl permanent tooth making its way into the world, rearing its bumpity little head, causing parents to hide tears of sadness--I mean joy.

Thea is genuinely happy about the prospect of gaining a big girl tooth in the place of her silly old baby tooth. She is genuinely happy about her first visit from unicorns and the tooth fairy.

But I'm not as easily convinced that this tooth thing is a good thing.

It means one thing: I'm losing my baby. She is being replaced by a girl. A big, big girl, a teenager, almost. And there is nothing to be done about it.

Do you hear that internet? Nothing.

She will grow and I will mourn and hold on to the bits of baby that are left, cat whiskers, for example.

When she stops drawing 100-whiskered cats, expect another ridiculously maudlin post from me. You might not want to be around, say, when I write about her first day of kindergarten (September, you've been warned).

Love you baby girl.

Love you. Always.

Eel the Komodo Dragon

Cole's class is making self-published, hard cover books. He is very excited about this project.

I found this draft on our dining room table.

PS--I asked Cole a little bit about his drawing and ideas. He reports that the picture is Eel in Antarctica, one of the many places the Komodo dragon tries out in his search.

Eel The Komodo Dragon

This story is about one Komodo dragon. He just doesn't know that where he is is where he should be so he goes to different places and tries to find his true home but when he finds out that where he was is his true home he has to fix his life.

Living

Rumbling thoughts. Trying to remember so that I don't forget.

Horribly sentimental, remembering my babies in the house. Round the table, the center of this house, talking about Howard Blackburn and what makes a hero.

Colored lights on the tree. Elaborate squirrel traps. Butter on steak.

Babies crawling across the floor give way to running children, through the yard, past peonies in full bloom.

Saint Francis in the garden says a prayer for us all.

Bless this family. Bless these people.

It is the people who make the memory.

We forget, sometimes, what we don't want to remember. Sometimes we forget what we want to remember.

But we try to hold on in some small way.

I remember fires in the fireplace and smokey living room, sitting in the sun, tea and coffee. Stone steps.

Halloween and masks and the piano. Knitting in the sitting room, knitting in the living room. Knitting hats. Mittens.

Her hands. His laugh. Our laughter.

Braided rug, in our house now.

Pictures and pictures. Listening with Aidan, assignment for school to retell a story that has been passed down from generation to generation.

The story of Nena with her sister and her German mother in Washington DC in the park and being asked not to speak German. Nena's memory. Nanny's memory and now Aidan's memory, recorded in her Book of Me.

The memories continue as I think. Some flutter in front of me and are lovely and disappear as quickly as I have remembered them. Some linger, like stringed instruments.

There is beauty and sadness in memories. There is something ghostly that comes from knowing that this is my memory and only my memory.

Others have different memories. We try to remember what we want.

Living becomes mixed up with dying.

Influence

e.e. cummings poem, followed by ra ra riot lyrics

dying is fine)but Death

?o
baby
i

wouldn't like

Death if Death
were
good:for

when(instead of stopping to think)you

begin to feel of it,dying
's miraculous
why?be

cause dying is

perfectly natural;perfectly
putting
it mildly lively(but

Death

is strictly
scientific
& artificial &

evil & legal)

we thank thee
god
almighty for dying
(forgive us,o life!the sin of Death


Dying is Fine, John Pike, Wesley Miles, e.e. cummings

To settle our thoughts
Never minding what for
nothing of a harm to dread
On my mind
Tell me what belies
Oh Tell me what I could have
Oh
Tell me what for

No more of this living dying
Just scientific analyzing
Forgive us oh life
The sin of

Death oh baby
You know that dying is fine but maybe
I wouldn't like death if death were good
Not even if death were good

Is this it
Maundering about and
All I have is too much time
To understand
One can only love
Life until its ending
Oh
And I can't forget

No more of this living dying
Just scientific analyzing
Forgive us oh life
The sin of

Death oh baby
You know that dying is fine but maybe
I wouldn't like death if death were good
Not even if death were good