it seems only honest to tell you that I am writing this poolside. we are at a not-quite waterwork; a city pool, with ample play structures and a lazy river, that still runs the cost of any other Parks & Rec facility, but that keeps my child entertained for exactly 2.75 hours longer than the other outdoor pool, and provides roughly 100 more lounge chairs than any splash park.
I have eaten a dozen or so peanut butter pretzels, the kind that look like nuggets of pretzel and are stuffed with creamy peanut butter, and are the only way, actually, that I will eat these. I am also the captain of the multiple chairs we’ve commandeered as Pearl and her friend take endless trips up and then down the massive slide, or cooling beneath the deluge the huge bucket of water dumps from the top of the jungle gym seemingly once every three minutes, or between bites of strawberry and watermelon. I’ve successfully shielded the snacks from ants and my sandals are hidden in the shade, a necessity in these brutal midday outings.
I’ve just taken a picture in the grimy bathroom, to remember the distance between this summer and the next. to catalogue the sky blue of this swimsuit against last year’s lavender. to send to a lover or keep to myself. to remember me by. to recall the me’s within.
the first photo I took pregnant was an underwear-clad dirty mirror selfie I conjured deep in the fall of my first year of teaching. I didn’t know. we were getting bad. I was bored with his breathing near me, and I wanted to shout down Royal Street: This guy has a tiny chin, and you only think he’s special. in the suspended time of bathroom constellations, I touched the edge of other worlds, planets, moons that were Paris; gaseous stars that were my parent’s basement. I wanted out and found it inside New Orleans’ dingiest bathrooms. ours was on St. Claude, between the Press Street crossing and Red’s Chinese. I’d unintentionally quit smoking nine weeks before—something about the taste of them. I’d only ever liked the heat and stink in winter, anyway, and now I couldn’t stomach their suffocating linger. I wanted everything off of me. the only things I liked were long, cool baths and The General’s Chicken at Red’s. I liked to pick the deep-fried bones with my fingers, slow-walking along the train tracks to the river, skipping home instead of stones. I took none of these as signs.
the entire world is perfect. the entire world is a delightful masterpiece of synchronicity. the entire world is a choreographed dance until the moment an ankle turns or a clock falters. everything is divine until the instant it is not. like, the pause between a baby’s breath—the held instant before they pull in deeply + you find your breath filling dry lungs, unaware it had left you. the world goes forward like this, catching breath and finding it again. filmy.
we’re not supposed to say how ego saves but, in the end you have to want yourself most. like yourself best. dig your shit. ego saves. ‘cause there’s no hatred like the loathing of meeting your gaze and knowing that what you’d allow for yourself, you wouldn’t give an animal, and you sure as hell wouldn’t keep a child; yes, as a child, I studied my mother slicing apples at the sink, drawing the blade to the pad of her thumb, never splitting her skin, just tracing paths, so no, the girl in me didn’t dream of labor. I dreamt of being my brilliant mother. a brilliant mother. also, I dreamt of being queen of Spain until my father said, You can not be anything you want to be.
so I dream I’m a talk show guest. Stephen Colbert asks me who’s my ‘dream guy.’ my curls are blown out, like Donna Summer on the cover of Rumor Has It. my billowy sleeves are a deep plum. I’m quippy but sincere, as ever. sidelong to the audience, I smirk + reply, “Marcel the Shell, with shoes on.” I get a laugh, as intended, + he taps the blue notecard or whatever on his desk as he waits, but I beat him to the punch to clarify.
‘The thing is, I say, look, no, Stephen, the thing is that Marcel would be the most devoted partner.’ I’m wholly sincere and kind of tearing up, which surprises everyone. he knows keenly the yearning for belonging + his tender, pure hope is precious; the audience is laughing + crying with me, but now I’m talking right to them. I’ve burst into tears. I make an impassioned plea to the studio to forge every moment with love, to be one’s own true love, to build a home in their hearts for themselves. to remember; to choose to remember what serves.
sometimes, I brush my teeth in the shower like a heathen, or a princess, or a “working mother” (it’s a thin line). I like to foam recklessly and let the frothy spit trickle down my breasts. I like to push the puddle of aqua out my mouth, my chin like a vampiric slushie melting to my toes. I like this most at night. I like to be covered in my thick ridiculousness and rinsed in the same breath. I call this luxurious. I will forget the toothbrush is on the shower rack by morning. I will forget to brush my teeth. I will forget I have teeth until I drop the kid at school, always one minute before doors close. I will turn to leave, daydream about milky Earl Grey at the stoplight, and wonder if I have time to place a mobile order before the next green. I will not have time, and I will turn onto 29 South, suddenly desperate for a caffeine pit-stop, or a ten-minute delay on the start of my work day, when a dry, warmish awareness spotlights the mouth. I will run my tongue across itself, wondering how I could have been so foolish, so rattled.
I will run the morning over in my head:
prepping lunches in the 6am darkness because I don’t believe in weekend meal preparation on principle, and picking out three sample options for the child’s outfits before she can demand I heeelllppppp and before-before she can tell me what mediocre choices I’ve suggested. waking baby girl with a pop song, turning off the foot-facing fan, and cooing her name, my hair still wet and twisted from the night prior. maintaining my cool as the world record for slowest shoe selection is secured, mumbling about ancestral guidance, recalling some parenting article about setting a joyful tone in the morning like I’m fucking Snow White or some farmsteading Mormon ballerina. packing a “gross facts” card + Ramen sticky (love) note in the bag. singing along to SZA for the whole ride and listening diligently to stories of playground betrayals. I will pop a peppermint Altoid from my purse, and remember that forgetting is the course and the norm, and the standard, for human hearts.
I should write a poem for my fickle heart, a poem to swear by in tomorrow’s forgetting, and the day after, too, but I remember I already did that yesterday.
bless the fantasy of her toes and hair follicles and guts. bless the me in me who submerged herself in daydreams, and endless forgetting, and hasn’t let go. bless my forgetting, insatiable heart, and the slutty politics that kept this blurry archive. I wish you had seen me. I always remember to remember her.