nine lives

The sun is finally shining here and yesterday was gorgeous, mid-sixties—almost unheard of weather for this time of year in Minnesota. It’s amazing what this does to the way I see the world. Hopefulness bubbles to the surface, escapes through my pours. I start imagining long walks and bike rides and loping, solitary runs during which my mind is free to wander, to come up with ideas for essays I won’t have time to write.

I took the girls to my dad’s this morning for a visit, and I noticed that the first of his crocuses have poked through the dark earth, purple buds ready to burst open at the sun’s coaxing. Soon his whole yard will be covered with dark purple Siberian Squill, and he will ask me to come over to take a picture, as he does every year.

Now I’m sitting in my little office. Zoë is sleeping and has recovered from her fever of a few days ago. (Though, unfortunately, she’s also fully embraced the Terrible Twos.) Stella’s bus will rumble past the house in less than ten minutes, and then she’ll come bursting through the door, her eyes wide. She will say, as she so often says, “Mama, I have to tell you something…” And I will listen to the report of her few hours at kindergarten, nodding my head and saying “Oh really?” over and over to keep her talking.

When Zoë wakes, I’ll strap her into the Burley, which she pronounces “Booooley,” and the three of us will head out on bikes to visit my grandpa, who, miraculously, is much improved. Many of you posted kind and hopeful comments about him a couple of months ago. I so appreciated these, but frankly, I didn’t think my grandpa would live to see spring. But now he has gained some weight back and his skin as lost its sallowness. He’s ready to step outdoors. How is it possible that 101 he still is not ready to give up on life?

After my piece came out in Brevity a couple of months ago, I took my laptop down to his apartment in the basement of my mom’s house so he could read it. (He doesn’t really understand what I do, doesn’t ever seem to believe me when I tell him how busy I am, so I wanted to prove something to him with that piece.) He read it slowly, nodding his head. And then when I closed the computer, he said, “You know, I should have died about nine times.”

And as if he were composing his own piece for Brevity, he proceeded to list the times he should have kicked it. But he only got to eight. “Hmmupft,” he said then, shaking his head. “Maybe there are only eight.”

His swelling is down, his breathing normal—he’s on his ninth life now. At 101, he’s not ready to go.

I’m still struggling with what it means to be a writer (or maybe I'm struggling with what it means to be a struggling writer). I swing between feeling hopeful—on the cusp of something big—to despondent, all in the same day, sometimes multiple times a day. Still, I’m not ready to give up. I can’t imagine doing that, just as my grandpa can’t imagine giving up on life.

So instead, I'll keep doing what I'm doing and wait and hope. And in a few weeks, I'll go to my dad's house, stand at the edge of his lawn, and take comfort in the reliability of his Siberian Squill.