bumping

I feel the words bumping around in my head almost constantly now. Little words and phrases trying to get out. I try and try to order them into a story that I can tell. A story of someone else in another place. But in the end, there is only one story that I know how to tell. Or many little stories that make up the one true story. The story of me. For many years I have felt the words now and again, start to agitate and press, sometimes oozing out into a few lines of poetry. Something that can ease the need for a time. I kept waiting for the crisis, the denoument. Waiting for something important that will mean something to someone outside of me. But now the words are too persistent. I wake in the night with a restless baby, and the words are there, waiting, restless too. I cook, I clean, I play, and mingled with my ordinary daily thoughts, the words insist -- it is time. And so I begin to write.

All my life I have traveled along a thin line. The darkness waiting on one side to swallow me up, and my blessed life, full of laughter, hope, and above all, light, waiting on the other, hoping to embrace me. I've tried to choose the light. And mostly I've succeeded. There have been dark days, laying on the bed, looking through the cracks in the slats of the blinds, and seeing that there is light somewhere outside of me. But at least I have seen that there is light. I have dragged myself through days where I felt that I was pushing through water to get even the smallest things done. But I know of others whose days feel like dragging themselves through peanut butter. So I travel that line. One foot in front of the other, balancing, balancing. Always a little afraid, but mostly just concentrating so I don't lose my footing.

It sounds so dramatic that way, so I should mention too the times of sheer joy. The delight I feel in the embrace of my tiny children. The happiness I find in caring for an innocent baby, the contentment, and pride in helping a child with a project for school. The pleasure in my husband's loving arms. The fun in playful moments shared with friends, or family. Belly laughs, light laughter. Light.