I was writing when my mother called. I answered, because I have a rule — if it’s my parents or any of my kids, I have to answer. I occasionally break this rule, because it’s my rule and I can do what I want, but I almost always respect the rule. She kept me on the phone for 45 minutes talking about blood pressure medication.
I’m happy to talk to her, we’re close and if there’s any way I can help, I will. But the writing is rare for me these days, and hard, and when it’s working I don’t want to stop. I was in some sort of flow, for the first time in ages, and the phone rang and I have a rule because of course.
Then, as soon as I got off the phone, my daughter texted. Ready whenever! She needs a ride, she’s coming over to do laundry and staying for the bf’s long-promised birthday dinner, that still needs to be made. And writing is effectively over.
I’m happy to get her, she’s mine and I want to support her in any and all ways. But the writing.
I shouldn’t complain (I should probably start all complaints this way — I shouldn’t — because I really do have the time and space to write, I have all of the privilege, and there’s not a war at my door), but this shit sandwich generation is a thing. It’s a blessedly peaceful thing at the moment, but I have four young adult children and two aging parents (who are not together and therefore not caring for each other) who have needed me hard and will again at any moment. I — the middle of the sandwich — am pressed and destined to be consumed.
As are so many of us midlifers, hanging on between the needs and desires of those we love. Finding a minute in the noise for ourselves. The noise that once was jazz — fun, interesting, beautiful in its quirks — is now chaos and I manage best when I can turn it down.
We’ve had the scary wee hour calls and the pacing hours in hospitals. Doctors and lawyers, bankers and elder care consultants. Student housing and assisted living. Holding up the sky for two generations, on either side, while the middle sags just above my head. What’s happening now is a breeze (if I can manage to tune out the droning soundtrack of plague and war) — a life with cherished loved ones, all safe and relatively sane. I should only be thankful for them and their blood pressure management, their laundry. There’s no wishing my way out of the center of the sandwich without wishing away the sandwich.
So, I’m stealing a morning minute to write nowhere near a flow, before the phone rings or the text dings, before the promised brunch and the tax conversations. This is a lull, there will be another storm. I just need to make sure there’s enough coffee.
Things to share:
The daughter sat me down to watch Sign O’ the Times last night and holy wow, I forgot. I’ve always been a Prince fan and saw the film when it came out 25 years ago (aka yesterday), but she recently discovered it and is obsessed. A film studies graduate, she says Prince had a “film brain.” Who knew. I just get lost in the voice, the guitar, the band, the dancing, the outsize energy of it all. We lost a real one.
Mooning over Henri Fantin-Latour’s flowers. Maybe it’s the chilly, monochrome, New York March. Or a pining for lost youth. Maybe they’re just really pretty.
Finishing Knausgaard’s Winter and loving it, even when I don’t. Even when it’s long-winded or boring or unnecessarily granular. I love it all. How does he do that?
Also reading Allie Brosh’s Solutions and Other Problems. Comics are not usually “my thing” (such a stupid thing to say), but this one is great. She’s had me laughing out loud often, and then stunned into reverent silence.
Made a berry pie last night — this one — and yes I am having a giant piece for breakfast this morning. With yogurt, of course, for health.
“Nothing can prepare you for this.” Rereading (forever) Mary Ruefle’s Pause, in which she so eloquently says everything I’ve ever tried to say about menopause.
I did not know this and now I need to know about the “bitterly estranged” part. (Note to self: Read T.C. Boyle’s The Women.)
Dolly!
Cheers!
Lisa