The walls

There are a few events in one's lifetime that the place you got the news will always let you remember the place. What is it about memory that sears your physical location to the place that it happened? It must be an evolutionary thing. That you always remember the place some world changing event happened so that if you need to, you can avoid that place. Funny how the mind tries to insulate a tragic event by marking it in your brain as possibly avoidable. Maybe that spot is imbued with memories of hurt. Maybe that spot is forever changed by that event. Why else would your mind remember it so strongly? Is it possible that every time you touch that spot of earth, a little of that tragedy touches you again?

So I remember the radio alarm clock going off on 9/11/01. I remember hitting the snooze and my husband leaving the bed. I remember him coming into our room after a few minutes, telling me that a plane had crashed into one of the twin towers. We got out of bed and turned on the television. We sat on the couch and both watched as the second plane crashed into the towers. There was the grim realization that this was not an accident. We both called our loved ones in Hawaii and California to make sure they knew what was happening. I remember asking my husband to stay home, to avoid the ferry, to avoid the down town city scrapers. He went to work anyway. He wanted to stop watching the repeating loop of the planes crashing, the people jumping, the ash choking all those people on the streets. Then they stopped the ferries for a time and I thought he would be stranded in Seattle.

But I couldn't avoid the bed where I heard the news. I couldn't avoid the living room, a place where I had watched the second tower fall. We lived in it. We avoided the media, turning on radios and televisions sparingly -- just enough to know what was going on but not enough to steep in grief all day. Like most people, we sent money and went to church. The whole world was reordered around me.

I imagine that if grief were paint, 9/11 would have sprayed our bedroom and living room. When my father died a year later, the rest of the house received a second coat. Maybe three. On my mother's first visit back after Dad died, I remember she refused to close any of the doors in the house, choosing to shower with the door ajar and changing her clothes in the bedroom with the door wide open. I think the grief was so big for her that the doors couldn't shut, even if she tried.

So we moved out of that place about a year and a half later. This new house has a couple of coats of grief too. Someday we'll shed it as well.

If only it were so easy.

Not a soccer mom

The beginning of every school year of my childhood started with the predictable writing prompt: "What did you do this summer?" 

I can tell you what I didn't do. I didn't work on my blog at all. I didn't get to sleep in except during August. While you working people would find that whiny, I am and have always been a night owl. Parenthood doesn't allow you to be a night owl. I remember being disgusted that my parents would fall asleep in front of the TV at around 9 PM. I get it now. Staying up past midnight and then having to get up at 6 AM so your son will be at the pool by 7 AM leads to crankiness and sleepiness. 

My boy took up water polo this summer. He's loved the sport since he took a summer camp for it about 2 years ago. What sealed his enthusiasm was the last Olympics when both the US men's and women's water polo teams silver medaled. After years of signing up for the youth league and the youth classes which are routinely cancelled because of low enrollment, he's finally old enough to play with the big boys. They really are the big boys because this is the high school team. 

At my boy's first game, within the first few minutes of him being in the pool, he made an assist for a goal, the first of that game! It was so exciting. Less exciting were 2 failed passes later in the game when he inadvertently gave possession to the other team and in the second case, assisted them with a goal. There was a little bit of grousing from a parent sitting next to me. I sidled up to them and cheerily asked them which player was theirs. They told me that their boy was entering the 11th grade and had been playing for 3 years. He was probably the team's biggest and most able player. I then told them that my boy was just entering the 8th grade and this was exactly his 6th time in the pool since practice started. They didn't grouse after that and were very understanding of his errors considering what a novice my boy was. At 5'10, he doesn't really look like an 8th grader, and when you add the fact that all you really can see of him is his head and sometimes his arms when he's in the pool, he looks like a kid who is much older.  I really like the group of parents of the water polo team. I've been told by a couple of them that starting the athletes in their 8th grade year really makes the transition into high school so much easier. They already know a lot of the kids at the high school and the older kids tend to take their younger team mates under their wing. 

That was exactly what I reminded myself of every week of summer when I woke at the crack of dawn... Well, 6 AM. He had practice every day of the week either starting at 7 AM or 8 AM and lasting 2 hours. Then he had practice every evening at 7:30 PM - 9:30 PM. The fall schedule is not much better except that the early morning swimming practice is only 2 times a week, but the evening practices are 5 times a week. 

I only had a break from that schedule while he was off at summer camp for a week and also for the week that he was taking his NRA Hunter's safety course. He is surprisingly good at shooting targets. He's angling for us to get him a rifle or a kit for him to make his own. I have to admit it is too much testosterone for me to make a rational decision about. Maybe I should just let his dad deal with all of that. 

Thoughts of my boy getting a college water polo scholarship started swimming in front of my eyes. One of the coaches went to University of Hawaii after she played for our girls team at the high school level. I started hoping hoping hoping that my boy could follow in those footsteps. Then a quick google search later, I found out that they don't even have mens water polo at UH. How does that happen??? I consoled myself that Stanford, M.I.T., Harvard, and Princeton do. Still, him going to UH would have been nice so he'd be around family.

I'm adjusting to dealing with a sport that will require me to get on the ferry to go to games. This is something that a lot of parents do here on the island. I've always thought it was crazy to do, but when I think that the people on the US National team are playing well into their 30s, I realize that this is a sport that can guide my boy through his high school, college, and young adult years. I suppose that getting up early and dealing with the ferry will be easy enough for me to do. 

There will be no reprieve for me when the season is over though. Most of the boys are also on the swim team to improve their form and speed in the water. I've heard rumors that swim team practice starts at 5 am. 

Bummer.