savagemama

Can we talk for a minute about my wee babe? My perfect, precious angel? That sweet creature that didn’t leave my side for nearly two years who was quiet, low-key and an absolute joy to be around.

Has anyone seen her lately? Because I haven’t.

When I asked Lucille a question the other day she turned her head toward me. Her were eyes soft, her face slack as she responded the way she does to nearly everything these days.

“Vagina? Butt crack?” <Read more.>

Parenthood stretches us. We all know this. It stretches us thin, it stretches us proud. Six years in, this is the stretching I’ve come to expect. The moments of pure frustration, the moments of bottomless love.

Then there comes a day like I had a few weeks ago where I found myself stretching, again, but in ways I never expected.

As you may know, my daughter is a tomboy. She never combs her hair, she wears boy clothes and is mildly obsessed with skateboarding. And a few weeks ago, she let me know in no uncertain terms that she needed new shoes.

“My toe is at the end,” she said. “And the back is bumpy.”

“The back is bumpy?” I said.

“Yeah,” she said, “back here it’s bumpy on my heel.”

I ran my fingers along the back of her shoe and, where shoe meets heel, it was, in fact, bumpy. The inside of the shoe had broken down to the point that it was scratching her heel as she walked. This, I imagine, is the result of putting said shoes on without untying them, but whatever, she was right. It was time. <Read more.>

Lately, my step dad and I have been trading pictures. Chocolate pound cake, chicken and dumplins, meatloaf wrapped in bacon. He doesn’t usually write much except to tell me to say hey to the girls for him. The pictures need no descriptors, they speak for themselves.

I thought about him tonight as I scraped together something to eat. We’d gotten home a little late after a meet up with a friend I don’t see enough of these days. We’d had the power-talk, the girl-we’ve-been-friends-a-long-time-so-spill-it-because-we-only-have-an-hour-so-go kind of date. Four kids in front of a movie and talk we did. We still have 480 other things to cover but we got pretty far down the road this afternoon which meant Eliza, Lucille and I landed in our dirty kitchen hungry and on the verge of cranky.

As I carried backpacks, my computer, coats, at least one pair of shoes, yesterdays ballet outfit and disemboweled lunches boxes through the door, our starving 80 pound lab nearly tripped me because she couldn’t wait to go stand beside her food bowl. I let fall all of the crap I was carrying and asked Eliza to feed the dogs while I put on my favorite pair of jeans. Hole in the knee, hole in ass. You know the ones. Back downstairs I rummaged in the fridge.

Tacos! I quickly browned hamburger meat while refereeing the nightly sister throw down that is inevitable these days and began digging for tortillas.

Corn? Nope. Flour. Nope. Hard or soft shell? Nope.

Chips! We’ll have nachos. Plan B. I’m rolling with it. I’m flexible.

No chips. Dude. <Read More>

Two nights ago I fried chicken in butter. I’m not sure I’ve ever fried chicken in my adult life but Eliza had asked the day before, “Mama, what’s a dumpling?” So I dug up a recipe for chicken and dumplings, the only way I’ve ever eaten dumplings, and found myself standing over a sizzling pan.

I dredged the chicken in flour and browned both sides of three whole breasts. My kitchen smelled like five years old, Sunday afternoons and the kids’ table my grandmother would set up for me and my cousins. And once again my mind drifted back to her.

I’d left her lying in a hospice bed the day before needing to return to my daughters, to my life. When I said goodbye I knew it was for the last time. I knew the doctors didn’t expect her to make it through the night, again. She keeps surprising us all but, still, the prognosis in only a matter of time.

When I flew to see her the week before I’d hoped I’d get there in time. From the hospital parking lot I texted my cousin, who has tirelessly stayed with my grandmother every night since she went to the ER two weeks ago for signs of pneumonia, to ask if he was still awake. It was past midnight but I wanted to say hello, goodnight, goodbye. Just in case. <Read More>

I am really good at triage. When the you-know-what hits the proverbial fan a steel gate closes in me and I organize, buy plane tickets, drive through the night. I’m not usually phased by blood or bodily fluids in these moments. I can clean up my children’s throw up off the bathroom floor, clamp my hand tightly around their bloody finger, watch from within six inches while a doctor sews a deep facial cut. I’m a rock. Solid, emotionless, moving through a set of logistics to help everyone arrive at a safe place.

Seth reads and listens to lots of books about the psychology of trauma and can tell me that my brain was wired this way in childhood, that I developed this mechanism as one way to protect myself from the change around me. He can tell me that this closing off to accomplish a task may not be the best thing for my health. <Read More>

I have always loved to swim. When I was a little girl I’d bounce and splash for hours in water up to chest. I’d flip, kick and sink to the bottom of the pool relishing the muffled, underwater sounds, the escape into the quiet of the shallow end. I grew up in South Carolina where the summers are hot and, sometimes, the only way to find is relief is to get in the water. Somewhere. Anywhere. I spent lots of summer days swimming in borrowed pools. As I grew up, swimming pools became more about the bathing suit than the back flips and I eventually spent less time in the water. Then, I moved to Montana. I started heading into the mountains and, thanks to a good friend, began diving into cold mountain lakes. Dunking in water took on new meaning. Plunge, then onto the rocks to dry off and warm up in the sun. No floating, no bouncing. But pure exhilaration, nonetheless. <Read More>

Dear Missoula,

You know you’ve been my home girl for a while now. You wooed me way back in the winter of ’96 with snow up to my waist, warm coffee shops with board games and bars with cigarette smoke, back when that was cool. Even then I loved the drag racing down Higgins, boys in trucks and rodeos on the coldest night you could conjure. I left you in May that year, heading West and promising I’d return. I’ve crossed the country a few times for you since then. I started calling you home ten years ago, and really, I never thought I’d be so lucky. We’ve had our ups and downs, it’s true. But I’ve always come home to you. So today when I looked out my back door and saw the snow line 50 feet above the valley floor I had to wonder if I’d done something to make you angry. Did you overhear me talking about San Francisco? She’s fine, no doubt. But, girl, she’s got nothing on you.

Seeing snow the first week of June has got me thinking, though. Girl, how do I say this? It’s not me, it’s you. Maybe we need some time apart. Maybe we need to see other people. I’m not saying break up, I’m not ready for that. I just want to have a little fun and, really, snow in June isn’t my idea of fun. So I’m writing to tell you I have a hot date Friday night. With Portland.

I know how you feel about her. You are often compared to her, even called her little sister. I’m sorry girl, I just can’t help it. I know what you’re going to say. It’s probably raining there and I know you are right but at least it’s not snow. And let’s be honest even with all that rain, she’s got city on her side. And she’ll probably wear funky glasses. You know what they say, girl, all the hot girls there wear glasses.

If that doesn’t work out I’ve also got my eye on Asheville. We’re going to meet up in a couple of weeks. What can I say? She called. I called her back. I haven’t seen her in a while but I remember her all tank tops and long wavy hair. I know. Not to mention she’s all Appalachian and shit. Girl…

Did I forget to tell you that Asheville thinks June means summer? She thinks June means sun and warm nights down by the river. Just sayin’ girl. Warm nights down by the river.

I remember some of those, you and me. I know you’ve got it in you.

I’ll give you a call when I get back. Hopefully the snows will have melted by then.

xoxo,
savagemama

This essay originally appeared on mamalode.com.

I read A Dull and Witless Boy today by Colin Meloy. This is everything a graduation speech should be.

“The world beyond these mountains is a lesser world; it rests on you to make it better,” CM

Last week an audio clip was circulating the interwebs of a North Carolina Baptist preacher who advocated giving gender non-conforming children “a good punch.” Pastor Sean Harris of Fayetteville tells dads of their four-year old sons that may be wearing dresses for fun “…the second you see your son dropping the limp wrist, you walk over there and crack that wrist. Man up.” He basically says that anyone who doesn’t toe the line of gender stereotypes as an adult is “acting out childhood fantasies that should have been squashed,” evidently at the violent hand of their parents.

I purposely didn’t listen it to his tirade at first. I’ve spent a fair bit of time in Baptist churches in North Carolina and I had a feeling I’d heard it all before. I chalked it up to another zealot spewing hate who didn’t deserve my time so I passed over the story. Then as I kept seeing it on blogs I read, my Facebook and Twitter feeds and the Huffington Post Queer Voices, to which I subscribe. By the end of the day I’d caught a few snippets of the transcript like this one:

“And when your daughter starts acting Butch you reign her in. And you say, ‘Oh, no, sweetheart. You can play sports. Play them to the glory of God. But sometimes you are going to act like a girl and walk like a girl and talk like a girl and smell like a girl and that means you are going to be beautiful. You are going to be attractive. You are going to dress yourself up.”

That’s when the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Hey Buddy, I thought, that’s my kid you’re talking about. I wondered if he thought I should give her “a good punch” because she likes to wear camo cargo shorts and little boy underwear? Should I tell her now that she’s going to “act like a girl” and what exactly does that look like? Should I force her to wear pink and hope that the amazing, creative and lovely little person she is slips away into some kind of self loathing just so she can fit nicely into the role society has created for her? Should I tell her that there are clear lines she cannot cross or that violence awaits her?

Well, I’m not going to tell her any of these things. I am going to tell her that there are arrogant and ignorant people among us and that she should watch out for them. I’m going to tell her that there are people in positions of power that use it to harm children. I’m going to tell her that there is no limit to what these people will do to run away from their own fears.

Then I’m going to tell her that there is a big wide world full of love and tolerance. I’m going to tell her over and over again that she is beautiful and wise no matter what she wears or how she identifies herself.  I’m going to tell her that she is loved deeply and without exception. I’m going to tell her that there will be pressure, strong and persistent, to conform to what other people think she ought to be, how she should act, whom she should love but that she’s known exactly who she was since she was three and other people speed a lifetime trying to figure that out. I’m going to tell her to walk confidently past people like Mr. Harris with his delusions and deep seeded bigotry. That I will be waiting for her there, arms wide, ready to hold her for as long as she needs because she will always be my child and that she is perfect exactly the way she is.

 This essay originally appeared on mamalode. Read savagemama every Thursday. 

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