striking walls

Deep in my sleep in the dead of last night I watched my parents die. It was dark and cold in my dream as I left the home of a friend then strolled down the steep. Unknown others from unknown places joined me in my march. On the road below I saw a familiar car skidding down the serpentine hill toward a hairpin turn that I knew it would be unable to survive. At a swift speed the car—large and heavy metal, the kind that old folks drive—struck a vertical rock wall. Upon impact, the nose of the car crumpled, and I saw my father’s arm sandwiched behind the wheel as if it were a flag.

“That’s my mom and dad inside!” I shrieked twice into the crowd, “Someone call 9-1-1!”

Those last five words, spoken aloud, woke me from my dream, which left me nearly sweating, worrying about my sick little kid and about my indecision to attend Saturday’s DC march.

After a pee and a drink of water I managed to fall back to sleep until four when I awoke to Calvin’s grand mal. It has been twenty-seven days since his last one, and so it wasn't too terribly disheartening until the second grand mal two hours later, plus the spate of partials he’s suffered much of the day, and the rectal Valium, extra Keppra and cannabis I've put on board.

Truth be told, I’m exhausted, and at times yesterday so exasperated I wanted to strike a wall, having taken care of a writhing, vomiting boy who unwittingly punches me in the throat and eyes, and spending too much angst and energy fretting my decision about traveling to Washington. To be honest, if the trip were just slightly simpler, maybe I’d jump at the chance to join the hundreds of thousands who’ll be standing up for women’s rights, the rights of Black and Brown lives, the rights of Muslims, immigrants, refugees, the LGBTQ community, and the rights of the disabled. Last night at dinner I told Michael as much, saying that if raising Calvin weren’t so goddamn complicated and taxing—the sleep deprivation, the logistics, the worry, the medical analytics, the monotony, the physical exertion, the demand on my patience and nerves—I’d have few second thoughts about picking up and going to DC. After all, I've got my plane ticket. But I don’t think I can make it this time without spreading myself too dangerously thin and risking illness or injury.

Returning to my dream, I envisioned the car crashing into the mountainside. I thought about my parents—Dad whose been gone twenty-one years, Mom who left us a year ago last October—thought about Calvin, thought about Michael and me. Then I imagined Saturday’s glorious melting-pot of bodies and faces that I ache to immerse myself in—molasses black, mahogany brown, tawny, white, red-freckled and fair—and I was reminded of a quote by Maya Angelou I'd recently seen:

Each time a woman stands up for herself, without knowing it possibly, she stands up for all women.

Then I realize that, in my absence, there will l be legions of women—and allies—gathered in DC standing up for me. And while they're striking the walls of inequality in our nation's capital, while they are braiding an unbreakable chain of diversity, I’ll be clutching my heart and clenching my fist in solidarity.

our sick boy this morning