Somewhere in Maryland the sign said “Food, this exit”
Somewhere in Maryland, I turned to where the sign said to turn and drive so I drove.
And drove.
And drove.
And after a mile or so of lovely rolling hills an arrow pushed me to drive.
And drive.
And drive.
Finally, in a fit of frustration, I turned into a parking lot boasting some stuff claiming to be edible but not at all what my heart and belly had in mind. I turned off the rental car, dropped my shoulders and puffed out a spoonful of discouragement.
I leaned into my phone and texted my daughter who sat, three thousand miles away, upset, unsteady, unsure and needing reassurance from her Mommy.
I understand this need.
I crave reassurance almost more than anything else. I crave reassurance as much as I crave Reese's peanut butter cups and sesame seed bagels.
“Please, give me a nod to say ‘you’re fine, everything is turning out well, you are right on,” things like that. No major affirmations, just quiet confirmations I breathe, I am loved, there is some optimism floating about my psyche."
Is it too much, I wondered, to try to both hear my child as well as push open a door to several different possibilities?
My words, at first, only pummeled her far away self before I heard what she needed for me to confirm. I turned, ballet words, floating and jete-ing and spinning and twirling truths and facts and memories reminding my daughter-love of what was so and what is so and what will always be so.
Rain had joined us and poured frustration across my windshield. Lightning pierced the ground and made my innards turn. It was too much.
I cried.
And I cried.
And I cried.
Not just for this particular moment, but for so many of the preceding moments when tears sat, unspent, right underneath my forced smile or my downcast face, praying no one would see them.
Alone, with my phone and my fingers texting, and my heart bleeding onto these messages for my daughter I cried.
The light lifted my chin, like she does so regularly. She called me back to the moment and I sought her. I sought to hold her, the light in the moment.
It rained a mobile for me and for all Mommys who try so hard yet perpetually feel like we fall short whether our daughters are five months old or fifteen months old or five-and-a-half or seventeen-years-old or older.
I still didn’t know where I was in Maryland, just that the light called and my response, as always, was to reach back. I turned, I saw. A cliché waiting for my attention. The ubiquitous rainbow against gray.
The end of the road.
Time for me to wipe my face, to blow my nose, to take the last of these photos.
Time for me to continue to drive to someplace else in Maryland and Delaware and New Jersey. Other places filled with people I will never meet. Time for me to reach for the next other moment to be held and remembered.
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