Family

On The Eve of Your First Birthday…

~ ChanAtkins ~ 4 Comments

A glass of wine to celebrate…

Head full of ; ‘this time a year ago I was…’

Your brother and sisters are behind me writing in your card. Your presents on the floor, waiting to be wrapped. All I can think is; how? How can it be a year already? A year is nothing. Not a blink or a breath. It’s nothing. I sit here trying to remember how that happened…how those months passed, what happened and when…how old you were when you did this, or that. But it’s a blur, it’s out of my grasp. Surely you were always exactly as you are now?

Your red curls are turning blonde. Your new hair grows in straight. When I look at you I see one of the others depending on your expression and your mood. You are a perfect mix of all of them, and yet totally and utterly you. Walking for two months now, you push my hand away when I try to take yours. Already. You like to climb. You want to do everything that we do. You try to sweep the floor with my broom. You try to carry their heavy school bags about. You put toys down the toilet and try to scale the stairs every time my back is turned. You throw everything. You shake your head when I say ‘no’. You hate going to bed. You say ‘bub-bub-bub’ all day long. You love books. I know how to keep you quiet. Give you a pile of books. Any books. Our books. Your books. Board books. Soft books. Anything you can turn the pages of…and you will sit there for ages, a look of sheer concentration on your face, and that’s when you remind me most of your biggest sister. And when you get cross. When you get all mad and go all rigid and throw yourself backwards, with your mouth an open wail. We are all cruel and sit and laugh.

A year, a year, how can it be a year? They don’t give you enough time. Parenthood is one big rush. One big blur. Tearing about, never catching up. Trying so hard to slow a moment down, to grasp it, hold it, feel it and treasure it, to somehow sink it deep into your bones, into your consciousness, into your memory forever, but you can’t, you can’t, time moves you on. Life rushes you on. Months fly by. So much about you changes. It never seems possible that you will be any different than you are right now, and yet it never seems possible that you have already changed. I’m flagging every step of the way, breathless, left behind, knowing helplessly that every time you change, every time you move on, you are leaving me.

Parenthood is not enough time. Motherhood is the fiercest thing in the world. The thing grows inside of you, is part of you, breathes as you breathe, lives because you live. You talk to it. You are never alone. It kicks you and beats you from the inside, preparing you for the pain to come. It keeps you awake for the same reason. It is a thing, an unknown, a stranger and yet you love it more than you ever knew it was possible to love…

You hate it when the pain comes. The agonies of labour make you selfish. Just get it out. Get it out now. You think only of yourself and you dying. You think only of it being over, over, getting it out, out, out, and then the wet pop. The gush of uterine fluids followed by the gush of maternal love. Love is not a big enough word for it. You want it right away, You want to claim it. After all that agony. Your hands reach down, clawing desperately for the newborn child. You still don’t know it. It is still a stranger.

Until you get it in your arms. Until you pull it up to your chest, smell its hair, muck and all. See its face. Then you know it, and it knows you. And it doesn’t matter about the rest of the world, or anybody else. It is just you and your baby. Your child. Your flesh. Your blood and bones. Your seed. Staring back at you. Eyes look black and sparkling under swollen folds of fat flesh. Hair wet and bloody. Nose flat and wide. Lips full and pouting. Tiny bird like hands curling and flexing. The most beautiful thing in the world. The thing you would kill for.

Silence. Mesmerized. You take each other in. That is the longest moment you will ever get. That is the moment you could almost bottle up. You could almost trap into your bones. That moment goes on, and on, and on.

Until someone speaks. Someone outside of you and your baby. They speak, and things start moving on. Wash the baby, weigh the baby, dress the baby, feed the baby, take photos of the baby. Your moment is broken. Life tugs you both on. Time starts again. Chugging you forward. Into the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that, and the sleepless nights, and the endless nappies, and the first tooth and the first meal and the first noises and the first words and the first steps and the first birthday is here.

From then on you keep looking for that unbroken moment. You seek it out. I know them when they come. I know them and I hold them and I breathe them in, but I am as helpless as ever to the passing of our time. Me and you. Bub bub bub. Pulling at my lip. That little agitated giggle you do when you know you are about to be fed. The way you rest your head on mine, the way you wake up suddenly smiling, and laying your head on me, up and down, up and down. Moments of pure bliss. Pure joy. Feeding you in our bed. Feeling the tug of your latch, the milky swallows, the droop of your eyes, the smell of your head. The feel of your small body in my arms, in my hands, on my lap, on my hip. How I will miss it when you no longer fit…

Happy birthday my sweet boy.

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Snotgoblin

~ ChanAtkins ~ 2 Comments

I try to soak you up when I can. Addicted. You think I am playing when I sniff and inhale, but really I am trying my best to soak you up, to make you last. The snotty, toasty, chocolately smell of you. I wish I could bottle it up to bring out when I am an old woman. I’d be able to unscrew the lid and close my eyes, and there you would be. The warm sweet smell of milk and drool. I’ll close my eyes and open my arms and there you will be again, your chubby wet cheek pressed against mine, snot and dribble stretching from you to me, your ear and the way your red gold hair curls around it, and that fuzzy stiff bit that sticks out straight at the back. I’ll be able to feel your little fat hands gripping and pinching my skin. I’ll breathe in and out and I’ll smell the cheesy sweat in your neck, the damp of your nappy.

As for now, I do my best to hang onto you. But you are moving so fast. Snotgoblins are fascinating. A future unwritten, all that potential, all that possibility. Everything you were, and are, and will be.

What were you? You were an idea before you existed. You were a thought, a longing, a need, a want, an instinct. You were an ache in my womb. You were a dream at night, a wish in the day. Then you were a line on a stick. A positive. You were something. You were sick in the toilet bowl, and tenderness in the breasts. You were the taste of coffee changing. You were a possibility, a hope. You were tiny, you were alien, you were basic and primitive and roaring to life. You were a black and white image. You were snapped in time. You were my stomach writhing and twisting and changing shape. You were swollen ankles and heartburn. You were a boy or a girl. Healthy, or sick. You were everything.

What are you? You are a creation, a sticky mess, a mewling dependent, a cry in the night. You are heavy in my arms and in my heart. You are small hands in mine. You are some of me and some of him and some of them and some of you. You are big blue eyes and strawberry blonde hair. You are eating crayons and throwing cups. You are not like us, not yet. Not defined by rules, tradition or culture. Not narrowed down or constricted or affected. Not weighed down or strung out or lying low. You are all the wonderful gentle vibrant potential of human life. You are what exists before it all starts to go wrong. You are bright and shiny. Your hands are soggy. You feet are stamping. You are full of everything and yet you know nothing. You live on instinct alone.

What will you be? It can’t be predicted. Is it already written? Do you have a destiny or a path? What is around the corner as you grow? What walls will you hit? What disappointments will you face? What triumphs will be yours? We can’t say what you will look like, we can’t know what you will be like, we can’t guess what you will become. You are a mystery in snotgoblin form. A book waiting to be written. A song waiting to be sung. You could be anything, anyone.

But just for now, just for today, just for the smallest, briefest, sweetest moment in time, you are mine and you are in my arms, with your head on my shoulder, and I can smell your snotty, mucky smell, I can smell your day, and your fun, and I can feel your heart beating, and for just a second, you are all mine.

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To Be A Boy Of 7

~ ChanAtkins ~ 4 Comments

Today, like all days, I looked at you and thought what a glorious thing it must be, to be you, a boy of seven. To be you, waking up in the morning with a bright smile upon your face. To go to bed the way you told me you always do; whispering things you are excited about. Counting them off in your fingers, one at a time. To be you, never lost or bored, but full of things to do, full of ideas, moving from one fun thing to the next. Nothing weighs on your shoulders. You heart is full and free.

Let’s play a game and pretend we are lost. Not yet. When we get there.

Okay, so who will we be?

I’ll just be me, and you’ll be you. But we’re lost in the woods.

I can’t stop smiling when you are around. The light in your big blue eyes, the gaps in your teeth, the smudge of dirt high up on one cheek. They used to be so fat and round, but not so much these days. You are growing up. Becoming a stick boy.

When we get there, you are still holding my hand, and you have forgotten about the game we were going to play. I hold on as long as I can. The dogs are off, and we walk across the two wooden pathways, talking about the summer holidays and how to fill them when they come. When I talk to you, when I tell you things, I feel like there is nothing that won’t excite or please you. It’s just easy.

The days are getting longer, the weather warming up, and the squidgy mud is drying out under our feet. You remember the game and you pretend we have to find things to eat. We can eat leaves and berries. Dandilions and daisies.

I like the way you look at me when you talk. I feel huge, tall, towering over you, this white haired stick boy with dirt on his cheek. Smiling a gap toothed smile as his hand tightens on mine. We follow the stony path while the sky is stretched and blue. Down the hill and still your hand is in mine. You play the game, pretending we know the way home now. We just follow the path back to the house. Then we can have an ice cream sat out on the doorstep. I look into your face and everything is beaming back at me. All the things promised for the summer, building up and swelling inside your chest, the game, our hands, the ice cream, today and tomorrow. You live in each moment with your blue eyes wide. You want to go up the steepest hill. You never stop smiling, not once.

I ask you questions and you say ‘yep!’ and ‘nope!’ At the top of the hill you want to go left while I go right. We’ll meet in the middle further down. Then you shout out ‘3,2,1’ and run down your side of the hill, arms pinwheeling, white hair streaming back from your forehead, ‘whoooooooo’ you go, and I am laughing. You dash down, turn right and come back to my side. It’s in you now. The urge to move. With the sand and stones under your feet, and the wind in your hair, the movement has set you off, set you free. I point out a secret way. That way. Through the trees, where the hills are small but steep. Down, up, down, up, then down. Covered in thick green moss, springy, inviting, this way I tell you, you’ll like this.

You go first. Running again. Your feet pounding, your knees pumping, your little stick arms out to each side. You make it to the end and then start running back. You do it! You do it now! Ahh but I can’t run like you, it’s not the same once you are older…or is it? I take your advice and run like a lunatic. Like a fool, I thunder down one side and up the next, and then I remember how addictive the movement of running is. I am laughing and you are laughing at me. For a tiny fragment of a moment I am like you, I am seven, I am small and strong and on fire with the desire to move and keep moving. I am moving through it all, through everything, leaping over logs and branches, hearing the crack and the rustle, my eyes down, then up, my legs powering me on, my feet wanting to keep it up…Enjoying a ride o nature’s own little rollercoaster. I think I could play here all day. I could play.

But I stop at the end and wait and watch and laugh at you, and here you come, my white haired stick boy, yelling and hooting. Running so fast I am sure you will trip and fall into my arms. But you don’t, you stay up, laughter hitching in your small chest. And after that you keep running.

I have to count the seconds, as you try to get faster and faster. And now you are running ahead of me, always ahead and out of my reach. Little stick boy, white head bobbing quickly away from me. I watch you getting smaller. I think about how much more hand holding there is to come, and a little bit of me breaks open and what leaks out can’t be scratched back. I want to keep you and hold you, but parenthood is always letting go. I want to be you and join you, but your growing is too fast, your moments too brief. I am left behind.

Little stick boy running down the track, zig-zagging past the daffodils, legs brushing the new nettles, hair bouncing, running faster and faster and further from me. Do you like being seven? Yep, but I can’t wait to be eight.10750337_880996085252991_634165168261834774_o

Stream of consciousness for DizzyBean

~ ChanAtkins ~ 4 Comments

When I knew that you were inside of me I went to the river, because I didn’t believe in God or anything and so I asked the river for everything to be okay this time and I dreamed, I dreamed every night, you were a girl, always a girl, I wanted a girl and you were going to be a girl and I walked home in the dusk every evening after work and talked to you the whole time, told you all the fun we were going to have, gave you all the advice before you were even born, went through it all with you while your heart throbbed away on the other side of mine…When you were born your big blue eyes just stared at me all night long and you did not sleep and neither did I, and together we stood at the window and watched the new world coming to life outside the hospital and you were a part of it now, you were part of everything and when I looked into your face I knew you and you knew me, and the love, how can you describe that love?…Crashing hammering slamming thundering through me, frightening in its ferocity, in its intensity, a terrifying crescendo of primitive emotions as old as time itself….And outside the hospital the world seemed too bright and too loud and the ground too shaky, too uneven beneath my feet, and the urge was there to hold you forever, to never put you down or pass you over to anyone else…I felt like you saved me…You went to sleep if we played Bob Dylan or John  Lennon beside your cot, your hair grew longer and thicker, blonde with a hint of red, you did everything so early, you seemed old before your time, your eczema made you wriggle and writhe and cry and you scratched until you bled and we had to put socks over your hands at night, right up to your elbows and you slept between us and we held your hands gently until you fell asleep and you love your milk but not your food and for a while you were a skinny baby with no chubs! I had you facing me in your pram and talked to you the whole time, told you what everything was, duck, quack, dog, woof, flower, tree, bird…Boobah, Fimbles, Storymakers, Little Bear, Hoobs…I’m a blue hippo! Hipp, hipp, hipp!…Couldn’t put you down because you only wanted me, had to carry you everywhere, screamed in your buggy, screamed if I went to the loo or had a bath, make the most of it someone told me, she won’t feel like that about you forever, one day she will not even want to hold your hand…It’s not enough time, not enough time, never ever enough time…First birthday, yellow dress and hairclips, Boobah cake and talking Fimble, toy piano and Andy Pandy..Andy Pandy, Pandy Pandy! Lost and found so many times…you wouldn’t put him down, you had him in your arms in every photograph for years to come, you wouldn’t, couldn’t sleep without him…Second birthday trampoline, party time, fairy wings and Room On The Broom, every night after bath, wrapped in a towel to read it on the potty, a chocolate button for a wee wee, wrapped up tight in a towel and swung back and forth like a clock pendulum, tick tock, tick tock, ghosty maggot baby! Baa baa back eep ave oo any ool? Yessir, yessir, ee ag ool!…father kisskus, father kisskus, ee got stuck! Ee got stuck! Comin down the chimney, comin down the chimney, what bad luck, what bad luck!  Winnie the Pooh book at bedtime, all the actions, pat a cake pat a cake bakers man, round and round the garden like a teddy bear…Oakie book again and again and again and again and again, you got a mop in your eye! You’re shot out of a peanut!  To the crows on the phone lines on the way back from Devon; if you don’t get down I’ll punch you down!…Rory the Tiger and Anxious the Elephant! Pink sparkly wellies and fairy wings, summer shoes, look at my summer shoes! Brum Brum gets things done! Talking and talking and talking and never stopping, chatting away on your buggy board and Barbies and Princesses and Dora the Explorer, backpack on and map in hand…Barbie and the magic of pegasus! Scooper not Scooter and so bright and so smart and shining all the time, shining, but so unsure, and chewing your fingers and clinging to me, pushing others away, only mummy, only mummy can do it, blonde pigtails and blonde plaits and pushing a buggy with too many bags on the handles and getting so angry when it keeps tipping up but do it myself, do it myself, all the time, never wanting help…And it’s not enough time, it’s not enough time, it’s never ever enough time…and the days and weeks and months and years are stolen from me  and we try to hang onto them and slow them down and hold them tightly to soak all the joy from them but they speed on and tear away and you get bigger and bigger and you never stop talking, never stop talking, and you know it all, and you know it best, and you know how to argue and you hate to give in…Glasses and grommets…Concumber not cucumber, pagapink not pavement…and you never give in, and its maddening but it makes me smile, and you fall off your bike and get back on and fall off and get back on and you never give up and you do it all so quick, it all comes easy, but you take it all so seriously and still so unsure, still chewing the fingers and twirling your hair…I watch you skip down the alley way, I watch your plaits swing from side to side, and you are talking, always talking, and I watch you skipping away from me and the tears are there, always in my eyes behind the smile because I can see the girl you will become, the teenager, the adult, and it’s too fast and it’s not enough time and its never ever enough time and so I live in fear and regret and a pain and too much love and joy, too much to contain, I love you so much it hurts, I love you more than you will ever love me, I wanted you for so long and you saved me  and you are my DizzyBean and you are my Princess and you are my AngelPie and you don’t hold my hand anymore, but you do slip your arm through mine and pull me close, just briefly, and you always have your head in a book and you are restless and bored without one, and when you are not reading you are writing stories that take my breath away, and again the tears are in my eyes for you, for you, and it is still going too fast and you flick your hair and choose your clothes and you smile shyly but you are so polite and so smart, and now you are getting into music, ear plugs in at all times, faraway look in your eye, and you talk about the lyrics and you let me in and it feels like sharing the greatest of secrets, and you are so concerned about the rights of others, and so outraged that anyone is made to feel bad for who they are, and now you’ve gone and cut off all your long blonde hair…I said you have to give me a chance, you have to give me a moment to catch a breath and catch up and come to terms with the loss of my little blonde haired girl with the plaits…you want piercings and tattoos and you are proud to be different, and oh how that scares me and yet makes me swell with pride…you have more courage than I have ever had…and even when you argue and when you flounce and slam doors, I get that tear in my eye Bean, that tear in my eye is for you, from the moment I knew you existed, from the moment that love exploded so violently inside me when we stared at each other all night and you, you have made me a better person, a person filled with too much love, a person with courage and hope, and you make me want to be everything I can for you, and I will have to stand back to watch you go, to watch you skip and run away from me, again and again until the gap gets bigger and longer, and it will hurt my heart and my eyes will sting but I cannot keep you forever, I cannot stand at the window and halt that moment when I share you with the world outside and everyone in it, I cannot slow down the time, and it is never enough time, never ever enough time, my DizzyBean, my little Bean, time spinning on…that’s what motherhood is, it is not enough time to hold your hand, and kiss your cheek and smell your hair and sleep beside you and watch you dream….19348_103954659623808_7551742_n