A wedding day poem for my husband

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May 7, 2011

You.
You are hard to shop for on my budget.
The things you want:
A shimmering brass saxophone with tender keys,
A sterling Macbook with an i7 processor,
A smartphone with a face so smooth it slides into your blazer pocket like a sheen of ice.

Someday,
Maybe,
Baby.

For now, though,
This little love poem will have to do.
I know you don’t mind,
Not really.
Half a foot beneath that smirk is a
Heart as delicate
As a Sunday morning egg
Wobbling toward the edge
Of the counter top.
(I am good at catching up
Eggs with my
Long fingers
And warming them in my palm.)

Remember when you and I
Were at that restaurant on Valentine’s Day
Talking over tealights,
And you said something about
Pets
And I couldn’t stop laughing?
You do that all the time.
You say things—
You’re not trying to be funny.

You look at me with wide eyes as I laugh,
And then you start to chuckle along.
Pets.
I’m chuckling just thinking of it.

And remember when we were watching a funny movie
On the laptop in bed one night,
And I was laughing,
And you were watching me and smiling,
And I said, “What?”
And you said,
“I just like to listen to you laugh.”

And how you buried your face in my neck when I told you
I fell in love with you

Watching you
Across the room
Talking to friends,
And your face unfurled into a smile.

And babe,
It’s so innocent.
We’re childlike when
We say these things to one another.
We,
Who have lived enough to
Crawl before walking,
To decide,
And to march forward,
On and on,
Past exhaustion
Before lying down
In surrender.
We’re here today in a
Precious,
Delicate state.
It must be a miracle.
I could go on for pages,
But I want to marry you.

Weather on my May 7 wedding: A task to delegate

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None of my damn business

It occurs to me

That I could delegate

The weather

On my wedding day.

It’s just too much,

With five days to go,

Amidst printing programs and

Last-minute shopping,

To think of

Changing the weather patterns,

Too.

Erecting colossal fans in the atmosphere

To blow rain clouds or

Cold fronts away.

Building an immense clear dome

Over the whole Twin Cities metro area

To repel rain and wind but

Let the sunshine in.

Launching a new sun into the sky that would

Hover under any cloud cover,

And would be tethered to the spire atop the

IDS Center so it could never roam

Too far from the Twin Cities.

I just don’t have time.

I must have help.

But who to ask?

Who is up to the task?

Oh good god.

I don’t want to ask

Him.

He’s so unpredictable.

He’ll use this as a

Teachable moment about

Acceptance.

Pleas for mercy after a pitiless winter,

Cries of unfairness at flurries in May,

Don’t help.

All I can do is buy a scarf

In my wedding colors

And get my rain coat dry-cleaned.

Fine,

God.

Whatever.

You can have the

Weather-task.

You’ll do it anyway.

All I have to say is:

Thank you for the saying about

Rain on your wedding day

Meaning you’ll be rich.

It is some consolation.

12 days to wedding: Distractible

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Less than two weeks to the wedding.

This blank sheet of paper is delicious.

I love to plunge into the page.

The thrill.

But,

I haven’t been doing it.

I’ve let these practices slide away:

The writing,

The nightly inventory.

I’m still doing yoga–

Too vain to let that go–

And I’ve been remembering to pray.

Even if it’s after I’ve stood up from bed,

Am cleaving my contacts onto my eyeballs,

And twinges of discontentment–

The weather,

The laundry,

The job–

Poke my gut.

Then I’m back to bed,

Kneel on the mattress,

Pull the duvet over my shoulders

And finally pray.

Even yoga is distracted.

I put my iPhone on my mat to

Read my Daily Reflection during

Sun salutations,

And I’m light and bouncy on the words.

They don’t take.

I’m making lists in my mind:

Linens.

Flowers.

Lighting.

Programs.

Today, though,

I’m up and writing.

Normal feels good.

One more normal week before

Wedding week starts.

I have a lot to do.

Hello, have we met before?: A night with my old journals

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I was paging through my old journals

The other night.

1987 (13 years old)

To the present.

A couple times I chuckled

A couple times I cringed:

The obsessions and

Vapid concerns of the

Teenage or early-20s

Me.

Declarations of love to

High school boyfriends;

Gut-twisting fears of

Friends turning on me.

And booze running through like a

Narrow, toxic river.

Who was that person?

That girl-woman

Flailing forward–

I did move forward despite the booze–

Functional, they call it.

I suppose I’m the same person,

Really.

Leaner and more

Focused.

Quieter in my neuroses,

Or more deliberate about sharing them

(Like starting a blog!)

Not quite as naive about

Love–

Although I still surprise myself.

And the booze river?

Dried up.

The river bed still cutting through,

Permanent and available;

A tender scar.

150th anniversary of Civil War; Also anniversary of first marriage

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Photo: civilwarhome.com

April 12.

In the throes of planning my

Second wedding.

I saw a headline about the

150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War,

Which reminded me:

Seven years ago,

Destination wedding in London.

Giggling,

Drunk,

In a London pub,

Over the fact that I was getting married on the

Date the first shots were fired on Fort Sumter.

Now,

With three weeks to go before I marry Joe,

It irritates me that I would be writing about my

First wedding.

The implication being that I’m somehow

Not over it.

(Although when you have kids together,

You never talk about “being over it.”

You just figure out how to

Get along day-by-day.)

In planning this wedding,

Joe and I both say it occasionally:

“At my first wedding…”

At first I cringed when I said it,

Or smiled apologetically at Joe,

Who was smiling apologetically at me.

Then it just became a joke.

The apologetic smile turned into a smirk.

We’re weathered.

We’ve lived.

We’re vintage.

Bought once new and discarded,

Only to turn up as a

Find

On the rack

By someone who

Gets

The little details:

The fine stitching,

The unusual buttons.

When you have kids together,

These exes will

Always

Be

Around.

Sometimes you wish they would

Go away.

(Or in a moment of face-twisting anger and fear,

Worse.)

But they

Never will.

Interactions with my ex are

Calm and even

Friendly

Now.

Still,

I can hope that April 12 someday signifies the

Start of the Civil War only,

Which it was long before

Me and my

Dramatics

Came along.

Call from school

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I got a call yesterday.

My son’s kindergarten teacher.

I, who work in an office with adults,

Always have to adjust to the elementary school rhythm

On calls from school.

They always start rushed,

As if I’m dropping into the middle of a conversation.

Ever since he got back from spring break,

My son has been acting up:

Not doing his work,

Not keeping his hands to himself.

He’d been doing so well,

Making so much progress.

What happened?

“Maybe it’s his dad

Leaving,” I say.

“Yeah, I was thinking about that,” his teacher says.

My son’s dad had come for spring break.

The two of them had had so much fun:

Going on a train trip to Washington DC.

My son still talking about

George Washington,

The Washington Monument,

Washington DC.

And now,

He was throwing dice across the room,

And sitting in front of a blank piece of paper

Refusing to write.

“After all the progress we’ve made,

I just don’t want to go backward,” his teacher says.

In my office,

My cell phone pressed against my hot face,

I promised to talk to my son,

And his teacher promised to keep me informed,

And we hung up,

A little team rooting for my son.

On the bike ride home,

Swerving through construction on University Avenue,

Dodging potholes and

Tented sidewalk slabs,

I was thinking of how we would

Not be going to McDonald’s playland,

As promised.

There would be consequences.

So I got home,

And there he was at the dining room table,

Flicking the longish hair out of his eyes.

He crumpled a styrofoam cup in his hand,

And I

Sat down across from him,

And we talked.

Because that’s all I can do.

I can’t go back.

I can’t heal his wounds

Or prescribe his experience.

His father is his father

And that father lives in another country.

And I’m his mom,

And I’m here.

And that’s both his gift and his trial.

I can only guide, my

Hand between his butterfly shoulder blades,

Sometimes light,

Sometimes heavy.

Here are some tools to put in your

Thomas the Train backpack, Buddy.

You’re on your way.

I love you.

I love Minnesota early spring. Really.

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Everyday,

Soon after waking up,

I grab my iPhone to check the weather in St. Paul, Minn.

I have strong opinions about the numbers and symbols

That populate the app.

35 degrees this morning?

I like that,

But what’s with the smeary, translucent cloud?

That I don’t like.

Why can’t it be a

Marigold-colored sun

With a crest of white at the top of the little box to

Imply three dimensions?

I definitely don’t like tomorrow’s symbol:

Eight snowflakes in various shades of white and gray.

And 45 degrees.

(How so, snow and 45 degrees?)

And my least favorite symbol

For its ambiguity:

The weeping sun.

That’s today’s symbol.

Why do I care so much about the weather?

I work in an office

And I live in a house,

And any time I spend outdoors is deliberate:

“I’m going to spend some time outside,” I say,

Because it has to be intentional.

But I can get into a truly

Foul mood

Over an unseasonably cool forecast,

Especially in the Minnesota spring and summer,

When I feel entitled to

Warm weather

After the long winter.

I have this sense, though,

A hold-over from my childhood when I had

No opinion

On the weather,

I just wanted to go outside and

Play.

My sense is that,

If I get out in the weather,

No matter how crappy it is,

If I get outside and

Walk or run or lay out my mat and

Do some yoga,

I like all weather.

Yesterday, for example,

I tucked my yoga mat roll under my arm and

Walked to the park over my lunch hour.

It was sunny with a snappy spring breeze–

Too cold, I thought, irritated, as I walked to the park

And couldn’t find a perfect spot to lay down my mat.

But after moving through a yoga sequence

And lying in savasana

In the sun’s surprising warmth,

I thought,

This is perfect.

This air and this sun and this temperature:

It’s perfect just exactly as it is at this moment.

Airport good-byes

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About to leave for the airport

You would think that the

Airport

Would be a devastating place for us:

For me, and my small boy,

And his dad.

The good-byes we say just outside security,

His dad or I knowing we won’t

Squeeze the small body

For months.

But,

If you thought the airport was,

For us,

A scene of tears and

Drama,

You would be wrong.

We made an unspoken

Pact,

His father and I,

To have fun at the airport.

We send him off

With fart-kisses on his stomach

And tickles around his neck

And swooping hugs.

And laughter.

On Sunday, it was his dad’s turn to say,

“See you soon,”

And go through security

Alone.

In three months,

It will be my turn to say

“See you soon,

When school starts again,

Buddy,”

And watch them go through security

Together.

I know from experience

That for me,

The tears come at the moment they disappear from view

Behind security,

Looking not back at me,

But forward toward their

Gate.

It wasn’t my turn to

Say good-bye today.

But when it is,

On the ride home

I will turn off the radio

And let the tears run.

Marriage the Second: In which our heroine wonders what business she has trying this again

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Oh, and our marriage license came in the mail yesterday, too.

It was like a scene out of a sitcom:

Joe and I in a pre-marriage counseling session,

Reading through the vows we had written,

And then somehow getting into a huge fight

About who does the laundry

And how

And when

And who puts the clothes away

And how

And when.

I could feel the corners of my eyes drawing back,

Snake-like,

And I might have been hissing

As I accused

And reared back

And struck again.

The minister,

A young guy who looks like Joe would with a beard,

Watched and listened—

I forgot he was there.

I imagine

His alarmed eyes flicking back and forth between us

Before he finally interrupted:

“Okay, okay,

This is good.

This is obviously something you need to talk about.”

Walking out to the car

Two strides ahead of Joe,

I made a decision to

Glower

And silently contemplate what business we,

Who have both failed once at marriage

And can’t even cooperate on laundry,

Have trying to do this again.

But as soon as we closed (me: slammed) the car doors,

Joe suddenly and uncharacteristically started

Talking (purging)

About his history,

And the harsh refrains that play in his head.

I softened in the driver’s seat,

Listening and asking questions.

This was new information to me.

(Will there always be new information?)

We stopped at an Ethiopian place by our house

And ordered a veggie sampler

And held hands across the torn plastic tablecloth.

“Babe, I want to be the

Best husband

You’ve ever had,” Joe said,

And I started to laugh and cry at the same time.

We went home and went upstairs to our bedroom.

And Joe turned off all the lights

But one,

And I fell asleep to him

Putting the laundry away.

I did it to myself: 7 hours in the car with my ex-husband

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Didn’t expect to find myself at Union Station, Chicago on Sunday to take this picture.

It was all my fault.

I had booked a spring break trip for

My son and his dad:

The Amtrak train from St. Paul to Chicago

And a sleeper car from Chicago to Washington D.C.

My ex, who lives in another country,

Hadn’t seen his son since July

And I stoked my son up for weeks about the

“Field trip”

He and his dad

Would take on the

“Long distance train” to Washington D.C.

Sunday morning,

Departure day,

Arrives.

The Internet says the train is four hours late arriving to St. Paul,

So we sleep in and I call Amtrak at 10 a.m., two hours after the

Original departure time,

Thinking we’ll have plenty of time to get to the station.

“You wasn’t at the station?” the Amtrak rep says.

“Uh-oh. Amtrak sent a bus instead.

Left at 7:50 a.m.”

Phone pressed to my hot face,

I look down at my son,

Who is dancing a little jig and chanting,

“Long distance train!”

And my ex-husband,

Who is listening to my half of the conversation and,

Registering what happened,

Doing that thing he does when he’s disgusted:

A one-sided head-shake,

More of a twitch.

I look at the clock:

It’s 10:30 a.m. and the sleeper car leaves Chicago at 6:40 p.m.

“What you gonna do?” asks the Amtrak rep, rhetorically.

“Yeah, I gotta figure that out,” I say, and hang up.

“I’ll get you to Chicago,” I say to my ex. “Alright? Just, everyone relax.”

Internet search for one-way plane tix to Chicago leaving within two hours:

$400.

Gas in the Camry for the 800-mile round trip:

$100.

“We could drive. We have time,” I say to my ex.

“Really?” he says, softening. “It could be an adventure…”

“Long distance train!” yells our son.

The ex and I look at each other.

“Let’s do it.”

We load up in the car and are pulling into the alley within five minutes.

And as we pull out,

My son,

Who has no idea this isn’t part of the original plan,

Says,

“I’m excited to go on the long distance train!”

And his dad and I laugh.

Seven hours in the car with my ex.

I had thought we might have

A Talk

About our son:

Where he’ll be going to school,

Here with me in America,

Or there in Finland with him?

That’s our albatross.

But it feels right to just

Be quiet

And watch

Wisconsin roll by on a

Foggy, late-winter, early-spring Sunday.

And anyway,

Victor has so much to talk about,

So many questions,

From his little throne in the

Middle of the back seat,

Any conversation his dad and I start is

Immediately interrupted with queries about

How earthquakes work,

What trains are made of,

What happens when cars crash,

And so on.

We arrive in Chicago,

And I walk the two in:

The huge father and his small son

Clutching his rainbow blanket and his

Pillow-car.

“Is this where the long distance train is?”

“Yep.”

I squeeze the boy against my leg,

And father and son move off into the secure area

(Train stations have them, too, I guess)

And I stop them to take a picture.

“Have fun you guys,” I call,

And then go back out to my car for the

Drive

Home.

Epilogue:

I checked my voicemail on Monday night.

There were a bunch of messages from the weekend,

Numbers I didn’t recognize

So I didn’t listen to the messages.

A 1-800 number from Saturday.

“Hello.

This is an important message from Amtrak.

You have a scheduled departure from

St. Paul to Chicago on

Sunday, March 20.

That trip has been canceled due to

Inclement weather.

A chartered bus will leave the train station at

7:50 a.m.

We are sorry for the inconvenience.”