on bruises and black ink

Between the hours of 6:00 and 8:00 a.m. he pulled my hair, pushed off of my throat with the heel of his hand—his upper body weight behind it—and bit my ear. None of this Calvin does with malicious intent, it’s just the way he rolls. He’ll chomp on pretty much anything if it is in front of his mouth, and I’m waiting for the day when he starts to bite himself. I’ve heard stories of neurologically compromised children who engage in self-abuse; they punch themselves in the chest or the head, bite and scratch their arms, nick their corneas, but for us—for now—the only casualties appear to be Calvin’s caregivers.

In the therapist’s chair I lamented my bumps and bruises—both to my body and to my psyche—but my thoughts kept returning to the children of Sandy Hook. We talked about the twenty joyous little lives that had been snuffed out by scores of searing bullets. I hope it had happened quickly enough so that none of them had to suffer or witness their friends’ suffering, but in my mind I couldn’t see how. In a selfish stream of consciousness I spoke of my own joy and how little of it raising Calvin brings me, of how the scales of pleasure and hardship—worry, frustration, anger—are weighted like a stone compared to a feather. I told her, though, that joy isn’t the only redeeming quality in raising Calvin, but that having him has opened up realms to me that I might otherwise never have experienced—my writing, first and foremost. “I’ve always loved words,” I told her, remembering that my favorite book as a child was a thesaurus. I went on to consider that perhaps, in the past, I didn’t think that I had anything important to say with them. So I had stuck with what I was good at, the visual arts, my drawing, photography, designing and quilting, which I loved but that had never fed my soul.

In speaking with my therapist I discovered that my writing is much more than simply cathartic. “I think I help people,” I told her. I went on to describe what a beautiful art form writing is to me, how in my mind it’s another sort of visual expression. “I think of it like sculpting,” I said, and went on to explain that I build a framework, like an architect, then edit and shape the work, carving into it, adding on bits then smoothing them as a sculptor might with clay. As I fashion the piece I paint it with descriptive images, which perhaps transport the reader into my space, my head. I hope one day my writing will take the form of a book with delicately fibrous pages, jet black ink and a hard cover.

After a day of errands and walking Rudy the Dog, seeing my therapist and, most of all, writing, I am recharged, at least enough to endure an evening of possible frustration, hair pulling, shrieking and biting, but no doubt a smattering of smiles, joyous hugs and self-discovery along the way.