i am grateful for:
1) the stroller. holy healer of many cranky ailments. we walk, he calms, usually.
2) the community garden across the street. when the stroller finally ceased to soothe/distract, we went in there and i fed the boy amidst the tulips and raggedy beds of kale-to-be. he calmed down surrounded by all that soft greenery and gentler sky. we said hello to an orange garden cat held by a gardener who called the boy “beautiful.” i still don’t know how to receive compliments for my son. i guess i say “thank you” on his behalf? because i don’t own him. i didn’t pick him out with exquisite taste at a boutique. i didn’t have any say in making those eyes so wide and blue and those cheeks so puffy and pink. but there it is, his beauty. i have a hard enough time handling compliments directed at me. and now a whole other person to field them for!
3) the smoothie i just made: 1/3 of an avocado, 1 frozen banana, handful of blueberries, tablespoon of almond butter, extremely heaping tablespoon of raw cacao powder, splash of maple syrup. yummmmmmm.
4) soon to be getting MRI results for my shoulder. it huuurts. and i want to start on a healing path for it ASAP, but need to know what the hell first.
5) good customer service. i buy this awesome cold brew coffee concentrate that i mix with almond milk for my morning coffee jazz hands wake me up delish, and the last batch i bought tasted more like pickle juice than coffee. so i wrote the local company yesterday and the owner immediately responded, then sent me a tracking number and glorious coffee will be mine when the UPS guy gets here in a bit.
6) lowercase blogging.
7) mother’s day! woah, i’m a mom! it’s no longer a holiday in which i feel guilty for not getting the perfect gift (how do you say “thanks for having me?”) and thus just calling in flowers at the last minute! i can make other people feel that way now! weird. but really, i am looking over my shoulder and being like, really? me? a mom? i still look in the mirror when i’m holding him and think i look like a teen mom, much too young for a kid. somehow the age spots and wrinkles vanish and i just see this 17-year-old girl and a baby. i think motherhood is maybe (hopefully) something you grow into, like dress-up shoes.
8) yellow flowers from my friend julia. they are making this whole gray day better.
9) my husband. for being such a rad dad. as he bent down just to chat with the boy at the supermarket i thought, “i chose well.” because no matter what (and “what” always haunts me of course because “what” is what I grew up with), the boy has a fantastic dad. i guess the other “what” is if i will be here forever/enough. because i imagine anyone who has survived an illness that tends to recur in others with that illness, thinks more about that illness when they suddenly really, really have a reason to stay in this plane for the next 50 years or so. i want to be here for the boy through all of it. every important minute of love and life. i want him to be a boy with a mom who loves him dearly all the way till he doesn’t really need-need her any more. but if that’s not the case for some awful reason, i know he’s got a great co-parent. this makes all these thoughts bearable.
10) finding messages from the universe on the sidewalks of brooklyn (see pic).
