Part 13 (1/2)

I didn't sleep much the first two years in the forest house Miles, bless his hungry little head, wanted ht of my mother - and my own unquenchable, ive it to hi reborn in the forest

My exhaustion was of course epic, but only in that way it is for everyone else, too I taught full-ti for tenure so we'd have a shot at a life Andy too exhausted hiht and parented by passing Miles off like a football between us Thank God for breast pumps and bouncy chairs

The exhaustion of new parents is absurd Beyond absurd But I'hteous about that In fact, it's soether I want to tell you I think our exhaustion in the green world brought us to our best selves Listen to this: the first two years of Miles' life? When I was supposed to be depleted? I wrote a novel and seven short stories Andy wrote a novel and three screenplays Read that again How is it that so y?

Green world

We had no ti art in the woods So when Andy turned to ht over scotches and said ”We should invent a Northwest press that isn't about fucking old growth and salhed my ass off, and then said, ”Yeah, we should,” we justdid Which is how the zenith of our depletion changed into the zenith of our creative production Andy and me, we had another child An unruly literary press, which we named ”Chiasmus” Turned out, there were lots of writers in the Northere tired of old growth and saly called Northwest Edge: The End of Reality Because, you know, it was Everything ere before ere this, utterly transforave art to life, and life to art ina

I KNOW I'M MAKING ANDY SOUND LIKE A MAGICAL MANSAVIOR You're going to have to forgivesomeone who is your equal It's an effect of an astonishment: that I love men

And it's not like we have soinning, we fought Boy howdy I fought like a woman whose father had betrayed her and whose ht like a man who never had a father and whoseout our childhood wounds at each other Becausebecause we could take it Because there was souess IIt's not attractive No one likes to admit it or describe it or lay claim to it We want our coupledoms to look sanitized and pretty and worthy of adly But, I think that is a crock There is a kind of fighting that isn't ugly There is a way for anger to coive it a fore

When I watch Andy work the heavy bag, or work his body to drop doing o soy let loose and given forh like anyone else, our arguments are sloppy and dumb and artless We look like cartoon adults, just like everyone Like the ti roorabbed his cootta tell you People who never get angry frighten me

Andrew: man-warrior From the Greek

Lidia doesn't ures

And then there are the little sufferings thatas love

When I was 38 ht I heard him in that ay, even as I was half asleep Before ent to bed, we had heard so about Ken Kesey's death on NPR I'd cried soot up to pee, he turned the bathrooht on and shut the door

Then I heard hi on the roof I ran into the bathroom and he had passed out He was on the white tiled floor, on his back, his eyes wide open, his led sounds, white as death, seizuring

I yelled his nae of the tub and held his head in ive him a mini blood transfusion He came to, dazedly I called 911 I put a comforter around him A firetruck full of paramedics came I dressed my son while they hooked my husband up to wires and electrical machines They put my husband in an ambulance and my son and I drove in our car - the ambulance took the freeway I took the back roads I was there 12 minutes ahead of thelyceride problem that scared the shi+t out of us

The next week, driving to work inbolt fracture had cracked it open

My father's voice filled the ball of h the canals of gray an to not only hear ain, but as clearly as you see the face of your husband, your wife, in front of you, I sawOn his back, his eyes wide open, his

I nearly wrecked the car twice, unable to see the road or anything else,my brain ache

How to Hold Your Breath

KID STORIES

What sad little bobbers we all were

Here's a pathetic little ie two in a hooded baby blue parka and little red stretch pants ju ”WIM”

They say, and keep in mind the story comes from my now dead crackpot parents, they say I'd jump in any water I saw Pools Rivers Lakes The Shojita's carp-filled garden pond That I was simply drawn to water, and I'd run and leap with one of those silly toddler glee smiles smeared across my face, and then I'd sink like a stone

So sister, would have to ju to safety

So when I was three ned me up for swim lessons But it was ton, took off my little clothes and threw est kid there

I can't tell you I remember any of this, but I sure the hell can conjure up an i in the icy waters And I feel pretty certain I havefrom kid cold chatter If I learned to swim that year I did it in a frozen zoht of father, who, every ti stuck his hand and arry God and pointed back to the water

If there is o near it - it's too far back, or too deep

When I first began writing this story my son Miles was seven So that means I'm seven too so the course of an ordinary day all the ti pools The thing is, Miles can't exactlyswiets in the pool, there is no other way to say this, he's a spaz And he's wearing ear than a special needs deep sea diver Don your protective gear: goggles, life vest Then he wades in and has the ti like a water nerd When he's in the water he laughs and laughs He shows s that a his way across the pool like a water bug, and says, ”Lidia, look, I'” He throws his little ars and holds his head in this sort of strange crane upwards, his ged eyes looking my way It drowns my heart

When I was seven I won 13 trophies with little faux gold girls leaning over for the dive on top If my seven year old ear? Well first of all one anywhere near hi with that kid? Is he special ed? But the me inside the me would have adored him I betI could swiear

When I' around in the pool near us who look like they were born fucking seals even GLANCE at him I shoot them a death look so sharp it slicks their hair back, reddens their s a lot worse than water going into your brain They're lucky to have brains at all after I shoot them the look It's a look froe, I was a racer You know those little plastic wind-up bathtub things - contraptions with small flippers or limbs attached to internal rubber bands which, ound, rotate at alar a little dolphin or boat or shark shooting across the tub? That's what seven year old girl racers look like Heads doenty-five meters Maybe one breath Maybe Whoever ere on land, once freed in water, we grew dangerously alive

My son's been in swi lessons - level A - three tireen card that says mamma of Miles, your son can barely float, he'll only hold his breath above the water, if he's in the water without supervision he'll sink to the bottom like a tire, and they so hoive him another one of my trophies

When I ith his to alia back on

It's his head

He doesn't want to put his head in When I ask hio in o intominute He doesn't back down

”I see,” I said ” Where'd you get that idea?”

Quite convincingly, he responds ”Harry Potter”

Harry Potter

Goddamn that little bespectacled twit

I instantly knohich Harry Potter scene he is talking about It's the one from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, where the five students have to compete in the Tri-Wizard's Cup One of the trials is an ocean dive to save trapped friends and loved ones who have been suspended underwater by strange little sea witches with pitchforks Each student ical way to breathe underwater, or they'll die, and all their loved ones trapped underwater will die, water will go up all the noses and flood all their ears and drown all their brains unless they have special underwater gear Total kid death fest if they don't find a way to breathe underwater Neville Longbottom, the buck-toothed nerd kid interested in aniic Gillyworills and webbed hands and feet

Christ Why does anyone become a mother?