window light

Photo by Billy

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book art

pen drawing by me

I am working on a new middle school story called Coconut. It chronicles one girl’s crisis of identity when a new girl turns up at school. The new girl has black hair to her waist, jangling silver bracelets, and a British accent. This story is an exploration of the complexity of culture and race.

I am already thinking about how I will share these stories, once the collection is completed. Traditional publishing seems like a long shot, and I’ve yet to explore self publishing much. I know I can find a place for these stories online, and I even want to create podcasts eventually. Still, there is a part of me that loves the artful quality of books, the prettiness of words on paper.

To that end, I pour over volumes by publishers like McSweeney’s,
with their unexpected textures and imagery. Looking at these books, I have started to fantasize about making my own (very) limited edition of art books to house these stories. I could work with a local bookmaker, and incorporate drawings of the characters. I could have a opening. Serve wine and cheese.

Why can’t my imperfect stories be pretty, too?

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insurance

Will’s first real crawl, kind of.

At Virginia Tech this week, 32 college students were gunned down by another student, who then killed himself. My heart goes out to all of those parents who will never see their children alive again. Somehow having my own baby inspires a new and profound empathy in me. Hoisting William from his crib, I try to imagine how those mothers and fathers must ache with grief, after of all that time and care they’ve invested.

Sometimes I wonder if I can insure against the world’s random violence by having a second baby. I consider it, even though it would change my body and our lives in unforeseeable way. I think about it even though it would be a struggle, with Billy’s chronic pain, and my sometimes consuming desire to keep writing.

Before I had William, I would have been perfectly happy to preserve my life: its flexibility and adventure. But now that I’ve become a parent, I never want to not be one. Is it wrong to think that a second baby would serve as insurance, for our small family? I mean, what are the chances that the capricious dangers of the world could take two?

Here is a link to a series of short, informative CPR and safety videos for children (and adults).

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I am not my window dressings

William Powhatan Hunt IV, at 10 months
Photo by Billy

We need curtains to cover our back windows; the afternoon sun slants into our eyes, and in the evening people can see in. I shop for something, and the range of choice reminds of America: bigger, better, and mostly just more. Websites that sell blinds have more pop-ups than porn. I order free samples, and find my email full of solicitations.

It seems the same with most things: in every corner of my house, of my life, there is something more to want. I want nice clothes not made in sweatshops, and simple, wool rugs. I want neat, blunt nails, freshly painted walls, and a pretty diaper-bag. It’s fine and fun, this wanting, except when the act of wanting is limitless; except when the things I have say too much about me.

So I’m looking at our uncovered windows, and thinking: “I am not my window dressings”, or at least I don’t want to be. Maybe I will get nice blinds, or maybe I’ll pick up something cheap and easy. Maybe I’ll just squint into the light, and assume that no one is watching my life.

I am wondering: how would my world be different if I wanted fewer things, and the things I wanted were less important to me?

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time travel

Mom and Will, happy and sad
Photo by Greg Johnson (my brother)

Becoming a parent compresses time, and at the same time expands it. With Will nuzzled in my neck, I find myself sliding back into my own childhood: Remember the heartbreaking loneliness of young adulthood? Remember those hot summers spent down south with my cousins, watching heat lightening from the front porch? And how, when I was a baby, my mother held me close to her? Was she thinking the same things that I’m thinking now?

Then the next moment, with Will’s bird-like heartbeat against my chest, I am flung into the future, imagining what type of boy he will become. I hear him asking questions, the timber of his voice in my ear. I see him jogging off, looking back, as he boards the school bus. I imagine him, a young man, making his way into the world.

Sometimes when I set Will down on the round orange rug, and lay wood blocks out in front of him, he turns toward me, his arms reaching, and I am catapulted even farther into the unknown. In that far future I am so old that I am receding, and William is a grown man. Sometimes he has lucked into love, friends, like I have. Sometimes he is lonely, or artful, or just getting by. Sometimes he has a baby of his own, reeling him back to his own childhood.

No matter what, there is always that same pulsing energy between us. There is an invisible band, stretched out and pulling back. Look at how it twists and bends as it connects us to one another, to what was, and whatever will be.

Drop by the opening reception for Billy’s photographic series, The Number One City in America, which will take place this Friday evening, April 6th, from 6-8 pm, at Cafe Cubana in Charlottesville.

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