painted nails

I painted Nora's nails today. Jonah wanted nails painted too. The color was bright crimson red, seductive really and we all realized that Jonah actually has fantastic girl hands, beautiful, elegant, long.
While his nails were drying I got a phone call from some relatives and gave out the scoop again about my father in law. He is sick in the hospital with newly diagnosed colon cancer. There is possibly more cancer and more cancer and more cancer.
"Jonah, don't touch the table cloth, keep waving your hands........ Yes Aunt Janet, it seems quite serious."
We picked up the house without one smudge for Jonah. Nora peeled most of hers off and mine are a total wreck. Sadie would rather wear a dress than paint her nails (for those that do not know Sadie, she does not wear dresses) so she was paintless and in her basketball uniform most of the day.
We got in the car to go to the library. We were going to meet Gary there. He was out walking, out thinking. His dad is sick and people are still getting up and moving about the world. People are still calling looking for guitar lessons and I still have to feed our children. Everything seems in a state of dream.
Gary said he had a dream last night that he was falling off a cliff.
I didn't dream. I slept like a rock and then woke up and had a full minute
before I remembered. He is sick. He has cancer. He is almost 80 and these may be our last times with him.
At the library there was a party for our favorite children's room librarian, Cathy. She is leaving after 19 years and all of my children's lives. She has been there from Carl books through all the Harry Potters and more. She is leaving and Jonah showed her his nails. She thought they looked beautiful. They really did.
Gary came along after us strutting with a look on his face I don't even really know. He plowed in and proceeded to belt out several different kids songs for Cathy and the kids and pay tribute to her in the only way he knows how. Guitar, song, voice.
Jonah had a peice of cake and when he ate it a little girl next to him admired his fingernails.
We went to the animal store without Gary. We said goodbye to him in the front of the library. Jonah was crying because he didn't want to leave and I was frustrated that Jonah was crying and Nora was excited about her new Narnia CD and Sadie was happy about her new book and Gary looked pale, childlike in the rear view waving at us.
He is going to visit his dad. At the same hospital where his dad first held him, he will go hold his dad.
Jonah and Nora wanted to spend their $10 Valentines money from Grammy and Grampy on two new fish so we picked out a shiny fish bowl and two really beautiful goldfish and talked to the salesguy about the book "A Fish Out of Water" which he had never heard of. We told him to get it and read it and Jonah pointed at his new fish with his shimmering red nails, smiling all the while at "Baby Einstein and Nemo."
On the ride home we talked about life and fish and sickness and I imagined what I would say to them the day that one of their grandfathers dies. One is 80 and one is 55. One is in the hospital gasping for breathe, watching Fox news and talking about the Red Sox. The other is using his oxegon, watching Leave it to Beaver, playing "Gotcha Last" with my children.
Jonah is laying on the floor with his sister Nora watching Harry Potter. He has forgotten about the red nails.
I am swirling through the red nails, the laughing faces and the mudpies. I am praying for more days of childhood before I have to talk to them about goodbye.

MUSIC

Driving in Circles

Today we took Molly to take her learners permit test at the Registry of Motor Vehicles. It was her second time. The first time we brought her a few weeks ago she went in very confident and came out very sad, proceeding to argue with one of the workers there that some button wasn't working or something. That day she learned that some things are not as easy as others. Take her GED, for example. I think she thought that that was going to be easy, studied a little bit for it and then passed it with flying colors. Not all things in life are easy and I think she learned that day that just because a lot of other people tell you that something will be easy, doesn't mean you won't find it hard.
So we drove her down today quizzing her all the way. Sadie and Nora had some good questions such as, "When will you be old enough to drive me places?" and we listened to music. The girls and I went to a diner and got snacks and coffee and waited and then she called, happy and full of energy, she passed and could she please drive the car home.
I told her that she could not drive us home but after we drove Sadie to basketball practice we could drop Nora home with Grammy and go do a little driving. She was excited.
When I got home with Nora I dropped in on my mom and Grampa John and asked John if he would come with me. He said no. I asked him again, I pleaded a little and then my mom chimed in that he had been home all day and it would do him good to get out of the house and he said ok.

I thought, "This is good of us, taking ole Johnny out. Poor guy does not get out enough and we will get him out." John is sick with pulmonary fibrosis, out on disability from work, on partial oxygen and 55 years old. We'll take him out.
So off we went to the school where Molly was waiting for us. I told John to hand over the keys to Molly and he looked at me like I had five heads but rescinded. He said, " I don't think this is a good idea, we should start out slow." And I don't know what I thought or if I really even thought at all. I just figured if we gave her the keys she would know. It's easy, I've been doing it for years. I don't even remember learning.
But two seconds in the parking lot with Molly made it clear to at least John that we would need to stick to the parking lot so we found an empty part of the parking lot and we drove circles around it so she could practice gassing, braking, turning, signaling and getting the feel of it. John got to talking about the West Parish School while coaching Molly, about his days there, about different teachers he had had and about the playground. John had been a child here 45-50 years ago. We listened to him talk about his first grade room and some character from his past digging paths to cut to school. We listened and it occurred to me how important this moment was. It came to me like a wave and I laid back and floated. I heard all the words in his mouth come out and he was sharing them with us and this was Molly's first time driving and we were here and maybe he wouldn't be here in a years time or two years time and we would have this to carry with us. John and the car and the stories of West Gloucester and the steering and the lessons. Things go slow. People learn slow sometimes and other times fast. Molly needed to make circles in the parking lot for an hour before she hit traffic. Sadie needs to take rests in math because she can't absorb everything at once. Nora needs to read the word BAT for a solid year before she registers the connection between BAT and the black flying animal in our back yard in the summer time. I need to run slow before I can run fast and these are the important things, this is important. Be here now.
We let Molly drive through the cemetery next to the school and it was twilight and the trees looked like shadows in the sky. We read all the names as we passed and John told us stories about different families and different histories of his city, Gloucester. We drove by his mother's grave and I asked him if he remembered her funeral and her burial and he told me that he never went. He was twelve years old and he didn't go because his dad didn't let him. He said, "what are you going to do about it now, can't go on crying about it, what's done is done." when I told him I thought that was sad. He told Molly that right next to his mom was his 7 year old nephew lying there in a grave after being killed by a car 29 years ago. Tommy would have been my age and John rarely ever talks about him. One time he told me about the softness of his yellow blond hair when he was going to identify his body with his brother 29 years ago. I told him that I wondered what his mom thought about him as she looked down on him and he laughed and Molly and I both said she would be happy.
We got back to watch the end of Sadie's scrimmage and Molly asked John if he would take her out again and he said of course and then I realized that this is going to be a thing for them like the way that Sadie still loves to tell everyone how Molly taught her to ride a bike. My grampa John taught me how to drive a car, that will be Molly's thing.

I hope he is there to teach Sadie.
And Nora.
And maybe even Jonah.
Tonight we had ice cream for dessert and Jonah liked to talk about it:

camcorders

Sunday morning at 5am I roused Sadie from sound sleep to get ready for her swim meet in Somerville (start time 7am). She was cranky but I remember that she is cranky in the morning no matter what so we didn't talk too much and I helped her get dressed and bundled up for the cold and promised her a nice bagel on the ride in. She was tired.
The scene at the swim meet was like any other that we have been to, parents and children running a muck, purchasing swim gear, pep talking their children to championship status.
And then there was Sadie and I munching on our bagels, hair all everywhere barely out of our pajamas, laughing.
She was a little nervous. She always says her belly hurts before these events. I feel bad for her. I want to tell her that we don't have to do this and that we can leave at any time but I don't because I know that she really wants to do these things and that at the end she is always happy to talk for days about these things. I always hated that about my mother. Whenever any little thing became hard in my life she was always there telling me to quit, why bother? I know Sadie really well and I am glad that I do.
I went up to the bleachers to watch and there they all were. All the swim moms. I had heard about soccer moms and hockey moms but these swim moms are equally crazy. They are frantic and writing down times and statistics.
I had the Boston Globe and proceeded to read it from front to back.
What is wrong with me? Why can't I get in to this mom world? Why am I so wrapped up in my own world to relate to most people?
Anyhow, I waved to Sadie. She was happy to locate me and playing with friends. I admired her in her NSSharks swimsuit and her cap and goggles. I watched in awe at her body manipulate the butterfly and I thanked God for giving me her in all of her youthful glee and eternal hopefulness. When the meet started the camcorders came out and I realized (as I always do in moments like this) that I never carry a camcorder. I pretty much never do. I video the kids in the house and on summer vacation and I take a ton of pictures but I just can't imagine needing video of every freestyle race Sadie swims in during her life.
But then I feel bad and I look empty handed and kind of pathetic.
So I whip out my phone. My new phone has videoing possibilities and although I don't really know how to work it I looked like I did and I was in uniform with all the other moms. We were in videoing stance poised for our child's victory.
In the end Sadie improved on her times (I think) and did really well. She did not win a medal but these were the districts which is the best of the best all over the state. She was most happy about the pool size and that her team came in 3rd out of 18th. She talked about that the whole ride home. In between talking about Harry Potter and the piano.
I did have a video camera at her first meet. Here she is two years ago.