But nothing happened. Not a sound.

Early mornings are my time with the quiet Cricket. Sparrow lays next to me, clutching my arm, sucking down milk while we wait suspended in our hot bubble of a room. The fan gives us a sleepy reprieve even though it's too loud and harsh. It feels so good to get any air at all. I count the months every morning, as if they'd suddenly be different. I feel some of the anticipation of opening a present. I feel a creeping horror when I imagine Sparrow's heartbreak, the short space of my arms already filled, walking around jiggling a warm lump instead of being able to sit and talk, the aches of lying on my side all night, the bleary rapid aging of never sleeping, the exhaustion that leeches my energy so I'm no good to anyone, brainless, charmless, doughy, empty. I guess not having friends this time will make it easier. I remember the condemnatory words, hum them in isolation, and it burns. But then I ask myself if I want to be bullied, if I want to be controlled, if I could have just snapped my fingers and gotten over it, easy hurdle, right? What's another one? Last night Sparrow smashed her bottle in my face when she lay down next to me and I wailed "Why did you hurt me?" Please don't hurt me!" and she sobbed and sobbed with her huge elephant tears. She has such a tender heart, like I do, and I think I scared her. Afterwards I comforted her and told her, it's okay, it's okay. I made basil pasta with vegetables and we ate dinner together, said our prayer, listened to the Christine Jessop podcast (love!), Jon told me about talking to his parents and the eternal gulf. We will each always think it's the other's fault. Jon says he needs to learn how to speak a different language; I think that it doesn't matter what language you speak if no one believes you have anything worthwhile to say. 

"Rene and Georgette Magritte in The Car after the War"

It was a stiff ten hours in the car today, wasted sunshine, the horrible density of fast/junk food. I cried at the end of Middlesex when Tessie asks if Callie will be able to have children. I have become so much more sensitive to narratives of aging and decay, of the vulnerability and inevitable pain of having children. This trip to Mexico, even with the uglier moments (the way I never quite feel connected and am left with the sour taste of overshare in my mouth) felt like a honeymoon with my children. I felt so bursting with love for them. I couldn't take my eyes off their sweet, funny faces. They are both so charming and kind and sassy. Sparrow's word for snuzzling and our relationship right now is "Mommybaby!" She loves to pat my chest and then lovingly lay her head on me, My darling, clever lady came home with a few more words, "Moh," and "No" more frequent than before, "Jesse" (I don't know if that one will stay) and "MeeeEEE!" My parents' relationship with my children is the best thing about my parents' relationship with me right now, easily. That was why I cried when my mother brought out the chile rellenos, beaming at my sister's brilliance in making them (that, and I cry at everything lately). Chai called to me from his seat, "When are we going to get to Mexico?" and he cried when we explained that we were going home.I miss being there already, even though sometimes it felt so good I couldn't take it in I loved sitting next to Jon in the car, and holding him, and kissing his face, and whispering sexual things in his ear ("No, mah Racherr! You're being ignorant!") He told me this afternoon that he loves that I'm sexually inappropriate. I feel torn up, petulant, and smug about the loss of the friend group. One piece I'm struggling with is how to un-entwine this man I adore so much from his folkloric past and from the tribe that exists to honor that history and their shared connection. It was always something that both attracted and repelled me; the friend group has given me so much fun and blissful belonging and a sense of coasting on their intellectual superiority, but I'm spat out (some of them likely feel that I've spat them out also) and it has made me realize how much they really are constantly present in the fabric of our lives, and how many empty pockets exist now for me that I can no longer access. I feel my convictions are just but that doesn't make feeling left out any easier It's hard to have Mary and Jon both in and so in that I can't just ignore it completely. I wish I could find something that would help me differentiate, a relationship or project completely separate from Jon that is as fulfilling and absorbing as his friendships and incessant activities are for him. I don't think it is likely.

You can't remember, you try to feel the beat

Walking on the beach here, listening to music is like a sacrament, it was so cleansing, like keeping a promise to myself. I need to get back in touch with that ritual. I listened to the music of my Golden Age, 2003 to 2009. The songs from those years (including my mission years which were spent in a feverish addictive longing for "apostate" music) still speak truth to me and carve out memories with every note. The song I love most now is "Eet" and I love humming it as I'm wandering around here, "You can't believe it..." that loss, that freedom. The walk, though! Gave me so much clarity, I stayed even longer than I needed to because it felt so good. It helped me feel at home again in my body for a few minutes, reset my careful and worried mind. I walked past the body of a twisted pelican with white eyes, as I stepped closer, the eyes changed to red and it suddenly reared up, gawky neck height, stiffening, immobile. It must have been injured somehow because it couldn't fly away. I felt disrespectful for intruding on its pain and I whispered that I was sorry. When I came back, I told Chai about the bird and he retold the story "The celican had white eyes, and then, all of a sudden, they were red!" He asked to go see the dead celican over and over again until Lolo finally took him. He has been reminding me so much of myself on this trip. His imagination, his storytelling, his magical voice, his indefatigable energy, his innocent expectation that everyone loves him ("Hey, it's me, Chai! I'm here!") and everyone here does. Natalie and I are the only ones of our generation who brought children and watching all the younger cousins I don't know very well play with Chai has given me such a soft heart for them. They chase him and play hide and seek and monster and pass him around at the pool and catch him when he jumps off the wall. He and Sparrow are both so beloved and people coo and aww at them everywhere they go. It's very affirming to be able to share this sweet piece of my life with my relatives, who I really do love, but who I feel must be disapproving of me.

Last night my mother and grandmother were in charge of dinner and it was a Mexican feast as in days of yore. It felt so good to be there with the blue and peach streaked sky, everyone merry in their family t-shirts eating rio and enchies. Sparrow and I wore our rainbow dresses and everyone loved them. I love my little girl! This vacation has made me recognize how obsessed I am with my little family. I love spending so many hours with them, love how happy the sea and sky make them, love how Sparrow falls asleep in the waves and in the pool, love how Chai runs around so fearless and delighted. I have fallen asleep during every movie we've watched here, and last night when Jon finally urged me to go to bed during Memento, I climbed in next to Sparrow and saw her gorgeous face on the pillow, and I felt overwhelmed with love for her. I kept kissing her sleeping forehead and whispering, "My little girl, my little daughter, I love you so much." She is so dear. Jon and I took the traditional sunset kissing picture today. It's our third Mexico together. He wore his best backwards hat in homage to 8th grade eroticism. He doesn't connect with pining music like I do but he is my best Jonny and I am so glad we are together because he argues with my mother about moral relativism and kisses me so sweetly on the forehead. I feel so connected to him, lately. Like Chai says "Remember when you were a baby and daddy was too and Sparrow was taller than me?"

And I was a child, and she was a child, in the kingdom by the sea

Today, July 10, I am 22 weeks pregnant. Usually this is my favorite "size" and when I feel the most attractive with a baby bump, before the flesh slides around all the rest of my bones, but it's different here in Mexico because I slip on a skin-tight suit every day and see this bloated belly that everyone else presumably believes is empty, I can't suck it all the way back anymore, and I can imagine the way they feel sorry for me, the conversations they might have about how Natalie bounced right back (Lorraine body) and Rachel didn't (lazy body, fighting against her genes). My mother took a picture with me in the background that looked so distorted from my perception of myself (which somehow remains optimistically positive) that it sickened me. I have to be honest that I wasn't in great shape before I even got pregnant, but waddling around in this bulbous body, when I am supposed not to be, embarrasses me. It feels like I am taking on the physical form of what my family believes me to be, weak, undisciplined, silly, sloppy. I still prefer that over telling the truth, though, which would affirm their suspicions in other ways. I don't want to hear it, I want to keep it from being thought as long as I can.

Yesterday at the market I was talking to a kind family who lovingly admired the babies and one woman put her hand on my belly and asked me "Otro?" and I wanted to tell her, open up to someone I knew would be warm and happy and then never see me again, but I saw some members of my party watching, so I shrugged and shook my head. "No esta llena," she confirmed. But it is! I feel badly for denying my little one, but at the same time, h/she will belong to us and doesn't belong to the world, and somehow that feels good, too, to keep our little secret close to us.

I talk to the kids all the time about Baby Tarzan and they kiss and rub my belly. Even Sparrow says "Baby!" now when she pats me and Chai has conversations with me about how baby Tarzan will be "so, sooo cute" but he may hurt him if Tarzan plays with his tools. He asks if baby Tarzan will come out my butt, or my "bagina." I tell him and he says thoughtfully, "I think your butt, too, though." He's not totally wrong. :) Yesterday we were cuddling and he said "I don't want Baby Tarzan to come out." I told him we have awhile before that happens...but how can I not feel the same? My heart just aches for my sweet baby girl, too. She has no idea, she will be blindsided, I don't know how to maintain our sweet symbiosis. I have loved it so much ever since we stopped nursing. She loves to touch my nose, her nose, my ears, her ears, my eyes, her eyes...her place of peace is on my lap making faces with me. Her little arms are constantly reaching for me and she knows just how to tuck her head under my chin, fold her arms under her body and lean in and rock...I just want to keep rocking her, I just want to keep balancing the hours between these two. I want a natural, gradual shift in our baby dream world that is instigated by her growing and not being "untimely ripped" away from me, like Chai was. It hurt him, it hurt him deeply, and I can never deny that. Sometimes I marinate in this perspective and then feel jolted out of it when I read a story of tragedy and loss and consider that never-ending missing. Hopefully, that fierce hurt won't be the end, and we can continue building and creating and loving each other as we all suffer through the winter. It's just hard on this end with nothing but a hidden goldfish bowl and quiet nudging to imagine the beauty and good that may come forth.

Mexico is always a dense cluster of feelings for me, embedded with some bitter and spicy nostalgia of this beautiful ghost self wandering around listening to her headphones, pining, pining. Those feelings clutch me worst at night and when I see my Grandfather walking painfully from the condo to the pool, to the wall, making his rounds, greeting everyone with the same story. He is revered, but it is more difficult to deeply connect with him than it used to be. For me, at least, I feel so aware of the shadow unfurling at our feet that I feel silenced. I also feel like my goodbye, my piece of honoring of what we have shared, has to come in the form of the final poem. It's a quest I need to complete, but I feel woefully inadequate. I know he will be appreciative and kind of whatever drivel I dribble, but I want to do better than that, I want to know in my heart that I created something real, captured some magic and that he felt it. But time is running out.

May your memory move us forward

Chai climbed in bed with me at about six in the morning and I was so dreamily sandwiched between him and Sparrow. I'm in love with their warm little bodies so trustingly flung and pressed. I love that they want to be close to me in their sleep. I love that Chai always murmurs "You okay, mom?" I tell him I love him over and over and I feel it heals us a little from me yelling at him yesterday and trying to be fierce. I almost couldn't go back to sleep, not just because they had commandeered both pillows, but because I felt so giddy over how dear they are right now and what a "songs of innocence" piece it is to have tiny sweets that climb in bed with me and cuddle. Right now they are playing in the fan--Chai told me "It's pouring out wind, and we get ALLLL windy!"

My relationship with Sparrow has been thriving so much this month. She only occasionally cries to nurse, now, and she will snuzzle me in bed and fall asleep leaning on my chest. I love her so much and I'm so glad that we pushed past that rough patch because now that there is no assault on my nipples, her wanting to be close is just really loving and kind. She says more words, "bubbles" and "baby" and and "kay-ay" sings "Mommy. Mommy,. Mommy!" We sing it to each other. She helps me looks for Chai at the park by shouted "Cha! CHAAA!" They have such a beautiful relationship and love to be around each other. Chai likes to be instructive and Sparrow is happy doing his bidding most of the time. Yesterday I lay back on the bed and showed them the hard little 19 weeks bump (that's beginning to kick hard enough I can just barely feel it) and we talked about Tarzan and Chai said gleefully "Is he going to come out your butt?" I said, "Out my vagina!" and Chai said, "I think out your butt, too." He's not wrong. I can't come up with any affirmations about the lines of doubt and doom are so clear in my mind. We can't afford another child. Our relationship can't afford another postpartum so close to the last one. I don't want to do this to Sparrow. These are the words that keep revolving, that steal a little bit of my joy in June.

Last night Jon and I went to the Ordain Women vigil in SLC. It was so interesting to see the internet greats wandering around in person and it made me happy to see many friends from different parts of my life (Kayte and Sara the Vranes, Dorothy, Christa, Mary Kremer, etc). I crept around like a loser fangirl trying to touch John Dehlin's garment and finally succeeded in extracting virtue from him when Jared introduced us (At that point, although I'd been trying to meet him all night, I was like, Oh Jared really, you shouldn't have!). Some parts of the vigil really resonated with me (repeating the names of women and saying "May your memory move us forward", Janice Allred's sign, "we asked for bread and they gave us a stone, we asked to minister the bread and they stoned us", Kate Kelly's father declaring "I will not be silenced because my daughter, Kate Kelly, has committed no sin!") and others ("I will not be silenced because my Heavenly Parents don't want me to be!") left me a little cold, because I feel like people are still just creating God in their own image when they insist that God is a feminist, pro LGBT rights rockstar and Heavenly Mother makes contact por doquier. There may be something, I think I even hope there is a benevolent presence in the universe, I wish so much that Jesus is real, but I just don't find it useful to insist that the reality is a progressive God that is more appealing because it seems like it's just casting your values upon a mirror like everyone else does.

I liked being there with Jon. I love being alone with him, even though I ruined the drive up with angsty wailings about the future (we decided later I was just hungry). Jon is always so kind to me. He is my best friend. He is tender and sincere. I want to recognize and feel more how good he is instead of being dour. I want to be present, but I'm struggling with feeling so sad that our little world is ending. After the vigil disbanded we went to Aristo's and sat on the patio and ordered spankopita, gyro sliders and salty purple olives, hummus, cucumber yogurt and garlic spread. It was wonderful and we had a good talk about the friend group. Jon says I need to get in touch with the part of myself that does ugly things, that could do the worst things, recognize my shadow is just as alive as anyone's. I said I could understand the behaviors and wanting something so badly, even at someone else's expense, and the lying about it, but not the flaunting about lying. He pushed me farther and I acknowledged there is a part of me that could do that, too, that might feel superior and even want to punish the people in my life for their blindness. We talked about how a part of my feeling I can't revisit the relationship the way it was, even though I miss it, was the urgency from everyone else to just get over it, the invalidation. No one said "That makes perfect sense that you're not over it yet, in fact it's weird that we all are!" I also feel very justified in taking a stand against the coercive aspect to this. I don't think it's healthy or safe, even though it's the most fun thing even sometimes, and I do miss it, I don't miss it as much as I thought I would. Anyway, that's enough friend drama to last a whole summer. It's kind of nice to have time to go to the park and reflect on what my identity is becoming. Right now I am deriving a lot of satisfaction from taking the kids to do fun things--it really is magically fulfilling to be at Art Days or the park or the splash pad with them. It makes me feel like I'm a good mother and helping them have a good childhood.