One room.
I am in the middle of vacating a home. This particular room, though now empty of things, contains multitudes:
My sister sleeping on a futon while my niece slobbers on the TV screen with her hands as she steadies her newly-walking self.
Emily and I crying while we watch "Wuthering Heights."
Painting the room cathedral gray.
Making it my very first studio, my me-only space to read and write.
Sitting staring out the window, watching Joel garden. Separate togetherness.
One drunken night when we newly discovered, and filmed me dancing to, an ABC song.
Slowing morphing it into a room for a baby.
The first time Joel put Bowie in her crib, 3 months after she was born, and ready to move out of the bassinet right next to our bed.
Nursing Bowie in the early morning hours, staring out at the dead-but-always-fruiting pear tree (oh
how I will miss that tree).
Sister back for a visit, sleeping on a mattress on the floor after a drunken Madonna concert.
Bowie moving out of this room into her big girl room - me reoccupying it eagerly.
Kelly, setting up shop in here even though it's way too small for a big working table. Just because we wanted to be in the same room, working. Separate togetherness.
The great book purge of 2015, when I decided that I was done with the men of antiquity dominating the shelves.
Standing outside the closed doorway for countless amounts of cumulative minutes, listening to Bowie cry. Should I go in? Should I stay out? Motherhood's eternal question.
KJK picking up my camera to snap a beautiful moment as I fed Bowie - me so grateful someone captured it.
House guests sleeping on a variety of makeshift bed combinations - Jackie and the kids sardined in,
in-laws during the first days of Bowie's life, my mom lots of times, friends and family always.
And that afternoon light. Oh the afternoon light.
So many mantras scribbled on paper and posted as reminders. Many revelatory tarot pulls. Tons of the deepest yoga breaths.
Smudging for the eradication of cancer, for the clearing of toxicity, for the fragrant cleansing.
