Postcard from Paradise (and my grandmother's tiny apartment)

One would think that, when placed on a tropical island with few distractions, one would find the motivation to write for later remembrance of the holiday.  A few paragraphs here and there, coaxed to the surface with the nudge of Absolut POG, or whatever the day’s imbibery might be.

But one only needs a few hours below the Tropic of Cancer to feel how effectively the sun kills brain cells.  Not quickly perhaps, but with lethal determination, like a boy with his magnifying glass, vaporizing ants on a midday August sidewalk.  Pffzz…poof!  Pffzz…poof!

So it’s with mixed irritation and relief that I’m forced indoors due to my unfortunate allergy to the sun.  Meet my skin: no fragrance, no chemicals, no hair products, no sunscreen, no wool, no perspiration and, no blinding fiery orbs.

What keeps me outside the edge of depression about this is:

1.     Knowing that in two weeks my freshly-plucked chicken skin will return to a smoothness as good as can be expected for a nearing-40 woman who’s had two children but takes vitamins and fish oil.

2.     Knowing that I already live in the most perfect location for my condition – the gray side of the Emerald City.

I wasn’t always like this.  From toddler to high school, I would bronze in a way that could call into question my ethnicity.  And until eight years ago, I could sunburn at 2pm and be caramel by 6pm.  But as I’ve said before, having children changes everything, including the chemical make-up of your body.  Thusly, childbirth has left me with skin that’s allergic to everything, but sex that ripples like the Pacific between the Hawaiian Islands.  Deal.

The grass and trees outside our Kauai condo have a look, scent and feel that take me exactly back to my grandmother’s apartment complex in Santa Monica thirty-two years ago.  There was a short walk from the street-parking to her door, and within that distance was an expanse of grass and tiny white flowers that beckoned a (tan) little girl to run and pick with abandon. 

I’d collect dozens of miniature daisies, and my grandmother would sweetly put them in make-shift vases short enough so the flowers wouldn’t topple out the top, but instead sit pure and bright so I could proudly show my bounty.

Then we’d sit in the small apartment, with its scattered carpet remnants placed for comfort over the thinner, unpadded carpet, until lunch was served.  Every Sunday her lunch would relieve our craving for her cooking, which was comfort food not because of its nutrition and satiation, but because she created it and she loved us more than anyone ever would again.  It’s at the top of my very short list of Things I Miss From Childhood.  Brown skin might be number two.

Why, when I’m on a wonderful, beautiful, relaxing vacation, do I think of my grandmother?  Isn’t this one of the most important times to “focus on the moment”?  Another being when you’re with your kids?  (which I have learned in parenthood can be as challenging as the opposite mental task of distracting yourself from having a splinter removed from under your toenail.)

So in an effort to focus on the moment, here’s a short combined example of Being Present With The Kids and Being One With My Vacation:

“Mommy?” Gigi asked in her tiny Marilyn voice, her spiral curls trembling under the ceiling fan and shining with the color and glossiness of a sliced banana. "Do you want to go to the pool?"

It's a most pleasant 45-second walk from the condo to the pool.  On one side of the chlorinated lagoon is a rock waterfall and shallow pond.  On the opposite side is another waterfall that empties into a frothy, shaded hot tub.  You half expect a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model to emerge from the bubbles and rinse her hair in the falling water.  In slow motion.

Atop and around this rock mountain are impeccably kempt, lush flora in varied shades of chlorophyll that have the power to forever convert your favorite color to green. 

I know my time in the sun is limited, so I make the most of it.  Since being in a pool together creates a special kind of intimacy, and kids are generally ecstatic to be swimming at all, this is easy to do.  We swim.  We play.  They love Mommy in the pool.  I love them in the pool. 

And there it is.  One of the simpler points of vacation with kids.   Realizing, recognizing and appreciating that you can have a genuinely fantastic time together. 

Since I can’t come home with a tan, I’m bottling these moments to bring back with me.   I can bask in them as long as I want and the feeling takes longer to peel away than a tan anyway.

Son

It’s true.  I love you most when you’re asleep.  As you’re doing next to me now.  But that most is not much more than when you’re awake.  I’m just more tired when you’re awake.

I know you understand because when I sigh, you know exactly which sigh it is. 

It may be the Good God Can You Just Do What I’ve Asked 10 Times Already Sigh.  Or the I Can’t Possibly Do Another Dish Sigh.  Followed by the Dammit We’re Late AGAIN Sigh.

And sometimes the sigh is not even directed at you at all, but you notice and ask.  It’s the sigh that worries you most because you were so sure you’d been doing everything right. 

And I tell you it wasn’t for you, and that makes you happy.  And I forget what I was sighing for in the first place.

The other truth is, you amaze me.

When you were 3 days old, I laid you down on the playmat, the one with the red, black and white contrasting patterns meant to be visible to newborns.  Above your head swung the rings, just out of reach, not yet meant to test you, just for you to lay and watch.

But you wanted to be tested, so you reached for the rings.  You reached up like an old, trembling, dying man reaching for the light he’d waited all his life to grasp.  Determined as though it were his last and most important task.  You earnestly reached as if your soul had waited a hundred years to test its humanity.  And you got it.

It was at that moment that I understood how some men and women could be great.  How some had the inborn perseverance to reach the rings.  How they created their own inspiration.

You do this – reach for the ring – every now and then when people let you, when you’re allowed the freedom to pick your own challenge.  You’ll invent and create and play and answer and joke and feel. 

When I watched your first race yesterday, I was optimistically unconcerned with your stroke technique or your speed.  Instead I saw your future and what could be.  I saw you start to reach for that ring that I know you’ll get on your own.

The truthiest of truths is that I believe in you.  In your fiery passion.  Your deep empathy.  Your honest remorse.  Your intense strength.  Your encircling love. 

And your goodness, which is not blatantly apparent, but which I know you have.  You’ve inherited it from your dad, and that’s how I know it will be there forever.

So my son, though I take so much of you for granted, and I sigh more than praise, and I seem to get in the way sometimes, please know that above all, I believe in you.

Darling?  Wake up, darling.  Happy birthday.