when he said the words, i couldn't help but smile. when we stood in line i couldn't help feeling guilty. knowing me so well, he anticipated that moment when i would refuse it as if the luxury was too much for me because someone somewhere doesn't even have a bed to sleep. he could visually see it rising like red bubbles of guilt up from my heart slow and resistant at first, gaining momentum and rising, moving closer to my throat as if the current couldn't stop the cycle of my years of patterned thought from escaping small red bubbles of guilt from my lips. bobby locked me in and told me to go look around some more.there was a bella quilt that i fell in love with a few years back when we were living in california together. it is brightly patterned with multicolor flowers and scandinavian looking designs. i even registered for it for out wedding.
when we saw it again, i showed bobby how beautiful it was and he looked at me and said, "lets get it." i looked at him with the astonished, what you can't be serious look slash half uncontrollable curling smile, as i wondered...could you be?!?!! and then he told me in his bobby gulley convincingly insistent way, "yes. i want to buy it for you. i want you to have it so that you know that your dreams do come true."
he's like that. as if the years have taught him how to control my weight of emotions. so that he knows how high to bounce up into the air and how to slow down,
angling and arching his muscles to have me flat in mid air balanced like a girl on a teeter toter with my eyes straight on his stunned at how easy it is for him. he has become my emotional equilibrium. if he knows i am feeling confused, he stands strong and certain. if he knows i am bursting with glee and impulsivity, he is calculated and cautious. he tries to check me. and most of all, he has become an invisible beam supporting my every move.
because deep down in the thick of it, i know behind his words, exactly what he means. that he knew what i was feeling. that he had my second thought inside his own. that i was doubting my cinderella powers. that i thought i should just be settled with what was mine and not always reach or get disappointed from that silent wish i had been cultivating. he just knew that piece so deep inside me that i didn't even finger or explain because he already had a diagnosis. he knew it and behind the shadow of his words, i felt the peace of his strength reminding me that its okay to reach.
i don't know if its the house or the settling of summer smells or the timing in our marriage. but i know moving has changed something inside of me. it surprises me how well i fool my gullible self. that my tears surprise me. that i don't know their label until they are laid out like drained wilted petals bruised and curling. the ones i have to physically open just to be able to retrace the shape it once was. when we moved i got the asthma i had as a girl. it took me back to hawaii. back to a house with a roof blown off and spun out to land with a single mom and two brothers in michigan and my dad removed somewhere still in hawaii. as if i couldn't tell my own hands from those of my mothers. as if her life would be my own. i had to go back to remember and hear bobby's voice tell me, "this is our home. ours."
he's like that. as if the years have taught him how to control my weight of emotions. so that he knows how high to bounce up into the air and how to slow down,
angling and arching his muscles to have me flat in mid air balanced like a girl on a teeter toter with my eyes straight on his stunned at how easy it is for him. he has become my emotional equilibrium. if he knows i am feeling confused, he stands strong and certain. if he knows i am bursting with glee and impulsivity, he is calculated and cautious. he tries to check me. and most of all, he has become an invisible beam supporting my every move.because deep down in the thick of it, i know behind his words, exactly what he means. that he knew what i was feeling. that he had my second thought inside his own. that i was doubting my cinderella powers. that i thought i should just be settled with what was mine and not always reach or get disappointed from that silent wish i had been cultivating. he just knew that piece so deep inside me that i didn't even finger or explain because he already had a diagnosis. he knew it and behind the shadow of his words, i felt the peace of his strength reminding me that its okay to reach.
i don't know if its the house or the settling of summer smells or the timing in our marriage. but i know moving has changed something inside of me. it surprises me how well i fool my gullible self. that my tears surprise me. that i don't know their label until they are laid out like drained wilted petals bruised and curling. the ones i have to physically open just to be able to retrace the shape it once was. when we moved i got the asthma i had as a girl. it took me back to hawaii. back to a house with a roof blown off and spun out to land with a single mom and two brothers in michigan and my dad removed somewhere still in hawaii. as if i couldn't tell my own hands from those of my mothers. as if her life would be my own. i had to go back to remember and hear bobby's voice tell me, "this is our home. ours."
the morning when i woke with rays splashed on my face, i knew i was in my first house. my own house. the darkness of our old basement bedroom was gone. the bright 
white bending light of our airy room kissing my eyelids so perfectly i felt everything inside me. i felt my breathe lodged stuck inside my chest as if there were ten thousand tired hands inside my lungs moving the weight of every feeling like a pulley for every laboured inhale.
my mom explained it to us. that i was like a bird excelling in moving, flying, adapting to the air, but growing frigid and stiff when confined. a weakness that scared me. standing still. grounding. how do you ground yourself on a earth that is revolving rapidly only appearing to be stationary to the senses? how do i ground myself to one small place in time when we are meant to move? what was it about a house that terrified and evoked me so? almost as much as marriage but not exactly the same either. its like every piece of furniture carried with it some sort of significance some sort of dream for my life with tangled past webs i had to remember to separate and let go. a house meant so much to me. so much more than walls. it meant a family, a dream, a life, a plan, a vision for the future. then, it dawned on me. as much as i daydream, the future scares me. its a place i can barely even imagine.
i read that when a child has to wear glasses it is because there is something they do not want to see. i remember when i first got mine. i remember being in the office of dr. batista with my mother's voice in the hall. i remember them telling her the verdict they had already announced to me. i was nearsighted. "well, its bound to be one of them," my mother said in reference to me in comparison to my other siblings. and i can remember that feeling of how badly it hurt me to hear those words. my sensitivity to the approval of others already acute with child alarm. i tried to hide my welling eyes feeling disapproval. like i didn't want to be the "one" that had to follow in my mother's footsteps because by her voice i could tell it was a bad thing bearing disappointment.
somewhere without me even realizing i almost believe at that young of an age, i blocked my future vision out. that i can only see what is just in front of me from some of of conception i entangled for truth. i can daydream but it is so hard for me to honestly think about what is really to come someday. it obviously makes me a horrible planner. there are things i want, that i dream, but i somehow have lost that certain faith in being able to hope for the future. and this is so fundamental to my faith. how can i bear hope in my God and not hope in my own future?
as i thought about this while driving home from work, God gave me a vision of the two of us moving together. only i was this young girl with light hair heading toward Him as He was ahead of me, watching, waiting for me. but i somehow knew that i wasn't a girl, that i was me in every year, in every age, in the future part of myself, that we were moving into eternity together. that i was completely safe in every moment. i can't fully explain it, but i broke down crying to myself driving in my car in the middle of anacostia.
white bending light of our airy room kissing my eyelids so perfectly i felt everything inside me. i felt my breathe lodged stuck inside my chest as if there were ten thousand tired hands inside my lungs moving the weight of every feeling like a pulley for every laboured inhale.my mom explained it to us. that i was like a bird excelling in moving, flying, adapting to the air, but growing frigid and stiff when confined. a weakness that scared me. standing still. grounding. how do you ground yourself on a earth that is revolving rapidly only appearing to be stationary to the senses? how do i ground myself to one small place in time when we are meant to move? what was it about a house that terrified and evoked me so? almost as much as marriage but not exactly the same either. its like every piece of furniture carried with it some sort of significance some sort of dream for my life with tangled past webs i had to remember to separate and let go. a house meant so much to me. so much more than walls. it meant a family, a dream, a life, a plan, a vision for the future. then, it dawned on me. as much as i daydream, the future scares me. its a place i can barely even imagine.
i read that when a child has to wear glasses it is because there is something they do not want to see. i remember when i first got mine. i remember being in the office of dr. batista with my mother's voice in the hall. i remember them telling her the verdict they had already announced to me. i was nearsighted. "well, its bound to be one of them," my mother said in reference to me in comparison to my other siblings. and i can remember that feeling of how badly it hurt me to hear those words. my sensitivity to the approval of others already acute with child alarm. i tried to hide my welling eyes feeling disapproval. like i didn't want to be the "one" that had to follow in my mother's footsteps because by her voice i could tell it was a bad thing bearing disappointment.
somewhere without me even realizing i almost believe at that young of an age, i blocked my future vision out. that i can only see what is just in front of me from some of of conception i entangled for truth. i can daydream but it is so hard for me to honestly think about what is really to come someday. it obviously makes me a horrible planner. there are things i want, that i dream, but i somehow have lost that certain faith in being able to hope for the future. and this is so fundamental to my faith. how can i bear hope in my God and not hope in my own future?
as i thought about this while driving home from work, God gave me a vision of the two of us moving together. only i was this young girl with light hair heading toward Him as He was ahead of me, watching, waiting for me. but i somehow knew that i wasn't a girl, that i was me in every year, in every age, in the future part of myself, that we were moving into eternity together. that i was completely safe in every moment. i can't fully explain it, but i broke down crying to myself driving in my car in the middle of anacostia.
i love my Lord, who even when i just can't believe in goodness happening to me, gives it to me! even in the scariest shapes that i try so desperately to push away...a husband, a house. its like God has known so far into my soul what i long for, what brings me true peace and gives me to me. when all the while i am kicking and screaming and fighting it from happening as if it is the plague, because there is so much fear inside me telling me in every voice that it is not for me, that everything will break, that i am not worth it, that it will only hurt me. My most beautiful omniscient Mother and Father waits. They kindle the brokenness inside me telling me it is okay to hope. that my Father and Mother of Heaven give me a gift worth believing in and it takes all my bruised child faith to try to remember to try to believe it is okay to reach.
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