cold hands, warm hearts

make believe

My phone is brimming with puppet videos the big boys have been producing. Odd props litter the floors and a symphony of cooperation drifts through the house. I'm pretty sure filming is one way they've determined to avoid actual school, dismissing Pythagorean theory and fractions plotted on number lines, but cinema feels a little like art and english and I don't mind slash they're GETTING ALONG. 

Meanwhile Hank's been working on his first book report, recreating a scene from the story, planning wardrobe and set design. He made a list of materials he'd need to look just like that brilliant young man, Iggy Peck - a pencil, a pointer, green shoes and hairspray.

If the process of noticing comes first, all three boys have moved from fairly conscious consumers to pretty imaginative makers. Exploring, copying, creating... perhaps boredom's best gifts.

a better witness

Sometimes when you're surrounded by dirt, you're a better witness for what is beautiful.

the heres and theres

except basically just the heres, because we don't go anywhere

today, and tomorrow

How would you like to help? I hear Andy ask the boys in the morning, knowing they'll find something to contribute, unloading dishes or sorting laundry or cat care routines, knowing this invitation will land better than any assignment.

The arc bends, but only with help.

We listened to the story of Martin Luther King Jr. today, between diving into a "how do rice paddies work" rabbit hole and classifying types of triangles. 

The boys understand that we cannot only venerate civil rights leaders after they're dead, that we cannot just quotation mark the words of a hero from the past.

Perhaps we have the opportunity to help define justice today. Perhaps we can actively bend the arc right now. 

It's clear that the work must continue. 

How would you like to help? I ask the boys.

the longest month

There've been other Januarys, I keep reminding myself.

The one when we traveled to an archipelago in the Caribbean sea.

The one when a neurologist with a slinky for a backbone called to tell us our daughter would die.

The one when she did.

There've been other inaugurations and cold fronts, other dark days and new years.

There'll be more Januarys.

come gasp with me

Mom, look! Watch me do a flip! Watch me write my whole name!

Hank gathers my scattered attention and points me toward his own delight, like it's some sort of sacrilege not to share.

See the cats play, see the snowflakes, see the new neighbors across the street?

He summons the rest of the house as if it'd be negligent not to invite us all to love the world with him.

The boys are, have always been, a bulwark against bad days, contagious in their joy.

I appreciate the recent side-tracks, something else to do *instead* of panic.

Smell this soap, taste the chocolate buttercream, feel my new wool socks.

A million little pleasures.

Listen to me tell this joke, listen to me sing, listen to me count to one hundred. 

Help me make a list.