Today is the first full day of my first family vacation ever. Yesterday, we drove and drove and sat in traffic and drove some more. We arrived at a ridiculously luxurious "cabin" (= a house with log-look siding) that overlooks a wooded valley full of bears and owls (and an occasional centaur or nymph? one can hope). We ate at what I'm sure the locals consider to be a "fancy" restaurant in honor of my sister-in-law's birthday (and I think we all left the table grateful that we'll be cooking for ourselves for the rest of our sojourn here).
I've spend the last four nights in four different beds. I've spent the last week nursing three little boys back to health. It was a boon to my soul, bent as she is on tending to sickness of body and heart, brokenness, loneliness, and hunger. But I am tired. And I've been grappling with insomnia for about a month now, which happens to me sometimes when my heart and mind become overwhelmed. And (tmi alert) until last night I hadn't had sex in ... um ... ten days? (Sorry, but this is just where I am right now.) I hear that parenting will do just this to a person. C'est la vie?
And now, after a bath, some quality time with Kevin, nine hours of uninterrupted sleep, and two cups of Yorkshire Gold with raw honey (which is not currently local but was when we packed it) and organic whole milk, while my father-in-law is cooking me an omelette, and no one is demanding anything of me, and I'm not wearing a bra or any makeup, I think things are looking up. Some things.
Sevierville is hillbilly Las Vegas. It is crowded, neon-lit, noisy, full of consumer culture and tourist traps, miniature golf and drive-thru wedding chapels (no lie!), class-free motels and pancake houses and swimwear shops that give out free hermit crabs with every purchase (!?), and it is kind of vile. But there are quiet and beauty and the aroma of trees living in community where we are staying. And family. Family. It's so—huh. I just don't know what to make of family. I'm not trying to evoke pity here, so please spare me, but I don't have a family of my own. I have a sister, an aunt, two uncles, and a female biological source, but they're really mean to each other (mostly everyone to my mom, even though I love them all and it hurts me, whom they all claim to love, when they are cruel to her, and I so wish they'd stop), but the mom-dad-sister-brother-hanging-out-telling-jokes-being-unconditionally-loved-and-accepted-and-known-and-not-having-to-wear-makeup-or-a-bra experience is altogether alien to me. I don't think I'm very good at it, and I hope they will be patient with me when I inevitably break the unspoken rules of family relating that are certainly in place and of which I am totally unaware. This mother has never kicked either of her children (or anyone else, for that matter) in the ribs, and I'm just not sure what to do with that.
So far, I find the Smoky Mountains to have an eerie, haunted quality, so sublimely beautiful and yet tainted somehow, by a wounded, ill spirit. Maybe the agony and grief of the land and native peoples that the white man has raped for power and profit still imbue the air and water and ground. And the people. Maybe this is just my own slavery to stereotypes and fear, but I find the populace unsettling. Not altogether human. This is confession time, people. I am prejudiced against hillbillies. This is wrong, I know, but I don't know how to change. I don't know how to approach and empathize with, for instance, the people in the town in West Virginia that I heard about on NPR, none of whom have any teeth because all anyone drinks from the time of weaning on is Mountain Dew. I mean, holy crap, what do you do with that? I just don't know. Please pray for me. And the population of Sevierville, Tennessee.
Later I'm going to take a walk, try to find a path down into the woods, with water and my sketchbook and camera, and I'm going to try to get in touch with my soul, ask her how I can care for her now, get her sleeping and eating and opening and breathing again. I'll try to post things here a few times this week. No promises. If you're reading this, thanks. You're an encouragement to me. Love.
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7 comments:
I have to say I admire you for your openness on here. Not that I know what to do with some of the information, but that's perfectly normal. :-) And yeah, parenting does that.
Enjoy. Breathe. Sleep.
Strength and peace to you, my friend. I'm glad you're sleeping better and having some time to yourself. I hope that being with a loving, fun family will turn out to be loving and fun, even though, inevitably, not perfect. I understand the ambivalence and paradoxes wrapped up in enigmas and puzzles. Alaska is like that too. Take good care. I'm glad you're writing, and I'm glad I'm allowed to read about what you're thinking and experiencing.
This was great.
At each new sentence, I found myself relating a bit more and more and more and then I found myseld re-reading it all because I liked it so damn much.
I appreciated the TMI part. Why does it feel so good to let that stuff out? It just does, doesn't it?
Blessings to you.
Andy: And yet, I still want to do it. Isn't it ironic that the thing that causes parenting is the thing that is prevented by parenting?
Bev: And I'm glad you're reading. It's been very nice so far! I've even done something mildly daredevilish! (I'll tell you all about it when I come back.)
Rachel: Thanks so much for reading my blog! It does feel good. Not only sharing it, but when other people do. When we all hide our struggles, everyone feels like the only person with struggles. It's like when Tamie wrote about couples talking about how they have conflict. I think more relationships would work out and more people would feel much better about themselves (and therapists would probably have a lot less business) if we all saw that most of our struggles are common and learned how others surmount them. And how will anyone know unless people stop being prudish and start sharing?
Yay for you writing more on your blog! Yay for your transparency! Yay for you engaging new and befuddling situations! And yay for good families, everywhere.
I'm prejudiced too, comrade. We can be prejudiced together, and try to get over it together. I definitely think the first step, AA-style, is to admit that we have a problem. :)
Tamie: And yay that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity!
(That's step two.)
Actually, shortly after I wrote this, I visited the gallery of an artist who draws and paints portraits of the people who dwell up in the mountains around here, living long lives off the land. He's attempting to preserve a dying culture. They were some of the most captivating, haunting, exquisite portraits I've ever seen. I could barely breathe as I stared at them. I bought a few prints; I'll show them to you when you come back. You've never seen people so profoundly human. I think they may just help me to be a bit less prejudiced.
And that, my friend, is the value of art. One of the values. Let us never doubt our incredible importance, as artists!
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