Every now and then the constant noise of life with a kindergartener and 3rd grader hits pause. It's rare. But it happens. It happened tonight.
Asher was having a hard time falling asleep and after several trips upstairs to tell him to unplug the christmas lights and to stop moving furniture around, I just flopped down- exhausted from bedtime battling- next to him. Our heads on his pillow, in the dark, he asked me what I thought Wren was doing. At first I thought he meant wrens generally. I started to talk about making winter nests (do wrens do that?) but he cut me off. No, Steph and Wes' Wren. Wren was the kitten that our upstairs neighbors adopted when we lived in our apartment in Saint Anthony Park. Asher was 5 when he met Wren and we cat sit for her from time to time. She hated the boys and would hiss at them and yeowl, but they insisted on coming upstairs with me to feed her and change her water.
What made you think of Wren? I asked.
Don't you wonder how they're doing? Our neighbors?
Sure, Wes and Steph got married this last year, and Wren is doing great. They live in Alaska now. And I imagine A.J. still lives in basement, probably still works at the paint store. I didn't know you thought of them or I would have told you that. I'm surprised you remember things from the apartment that well.
His feet curled up next to my legs and he sighed. I remember all the good things there.
Really? Tell me what you remember.
Well, he started to move and wave his hands in the dark to show me what he was saying, we lived on the in between floor. It was really warm always and we made smores in the fireplace. I remember combing the hair of my mannequin, and it getting tangled. I remember writing with the window markers. I remember the dinosaur birthday cake you made for me, with candy rocks. I remember the 'Dragons Love Tacos' party - we made dragons out of paper plates. You cried after all the grown ups left. I remember walking to school and being close to the park, and my friend who sang on the corner. I remember the time we were taking a bath and the Blue Angels flew over the house and all the windows shook. And I remember our perfect bedroom, it was the best. I miss that bedroom. Can we make our room like that room?
When Ben and I divorced, I rented a floor of a house- that was what I could afford in order to stay close to Merriam Park (Ben) and land in a good neighborhood. 39% of my income went to my monthly rent, so I got a second job. The boys 'perfect' room was maybe 10x10 feet with two beds low to the ground that we painted yellow, hand-me-down shelves, and terrible fluorescent overhead lights that gave me a headache. We strung christmas lights across each wall so we never had to flip on the light switch. There wasn't enough room for a dresser so I kept their clothes in stacked plastic bins in the closet. I worried all the time that they wouldn’t feel like the apartment was home and thought about how someday I would buy a house where they could have a big, ‘nice’ room.
There were so many things to hang things on, can we do that here? I smiled remembering all the stuff hanging everywhere. There had to have been at least 50 nails and picture hanging hooks pounded haphazardly into their walls to hang art, mobiles, garlands, strings of lights (I didn't get my security deposit back- they charged $20 per nail hole).
I miss that room.
Fast forward some years, and here we are. We live in a new house together, as a family, and life is good. The boys have a bedroom that I would have dreamt of as a kid, but it isn't Asher's perfect bedroom. While we were laying there, we started scheming about a mural we are going to paint on one of the walls together. And how to strategically talk with Ben about adding some nail holes. It was a beautiful reminder of what matters in life, what matters to Asher. What kids remember and what makes them feel at home.
It was a good pause.
