My favorite childhood book was A Wrinkle in Time. I don’t think it was because the story was anything special, but because my favorite person in the world told me it was her favorite story. She lowered herself to my level, looked me directly in the eyes, the eyes of a 10 year old who didn’t know anyone really even saw her and said, this is my favorite story ever, and I want you to read it.
She handed me the book, her copy, worn and tattered, dog-eared with the binding bearing the grooved lines of having been open and shut numerous times, lying face down on a night stand awaiting the reader to return at daybreak.
I read the book, the first book I had read all by myself. I read it in secret, not because my parents wouldn’t approve, but because they really weren’t paying much attention to me anyway.
I loved the story because I loved my teacher who lent me her own personal copy. She was so integral in my life at that time. My home life was not particularly calm. In fact, most of my memories of my home life back then were my mother anxiously anticipating my father’s level of drunkenness and therefore deciding whether we needed to stay at a hotel or if it was safe to sleep in our own beds that night. I kept a duffel bag with pajamas and school clothes next to my bed just in case.
There is very little about the original story that I remember as an adult, but it still remains my go-to “favorite” book. I just remember a missing father and time travel. A missing father seemed less of a nightmare to me at that time, maybe because I welcomed the idea.
When I heard that a movie was being released, I jumped at the chance to revisit the story, but this time with my own children, ages 7 and 9. We have been reading it nightly for the past month or so. I’m not sure if this was a mistake on my part, as I haven’t enjoyed it as much as I thought I would. I really can’t put it to words, but now I am reading it with an adult mind, one that has escaped such a childhood, one that has made amends and even friends with a father that once tormented me.
I am reading it with a mind that remembers my favorite teacher getting a divorce, changing her last name, and dying from breast cancer. The weirdest thing I can say is that I still remember how she smelled when she would bend down to my level, look me in the eyes, and tell me how proud she was of me. She smelled like gardenias. She was my favorite person. After she died, they named a road after her. A road that ran passed the middle school where she taught in her final days. She must have been other students favorite person, too, to have a road named after her. I wonder how many of them were lucky enough to read her copy of A Wrinkle in Time.
Secretly, I hope none of them had the luxury, I hope that I was the only one.
Every 7 or 10 years, I have to retake my medical boards. I am currently board certified, but have to prove it over and over again throughout my career. If I jump through a bunch of hoops, like taking certain designated classes, performing modest in-office studies, and accruing a certain amount of CME between board tests, then I get to retake the boards every 10 years. If I fail to jump through these hoops, then it’s every 7 years.
My daughter is 7. She is in the first grade. It’s a sweet time of life because she still likes me and she still wants to be seen with me. In fact, she requests my presence the mornings that I drop her off at school. She wants me to walk her to her class instead of dropping her off in the car line. I walk her to class and she always gives me an awkward side hug before she goes inside. It’s hip to hip with an arm barely slung over the back. It’s kind of pitiful as hugs go, but I don’t push it. I want to embrace her, even give her a kiss on the cheek, profess my undying maternal love for her, but I resist. I relent. She’s building street cred and I don’t want to get in the way of such important work.
Let me tell you why church is hard.
My husband and I sat across from each other in Chick Fil A. Not the most clever of places for us to have a date night, but it was last minute, it was raining outside, and we desperately needed to go to the grocery store, which just happened to be across the street, before we picked up the kids. My dad agreed to watch the kids so that we could spend a few hours together, uninterrupted, to try to process the goings on of the past week.
I needed to turn off the TV. I had had enough. Enough is enough. I don’t need to subject myself to such vitriol, such hate. No more. I sat and stewed. What was I going to do with the emotions that I was feeling? How was I going to improve the sudden funk in which I found myself? I was angry, hurt, disgusted. He was condemning immigrants. Worse than that, he was perpetuating the misconception that immigrants are worthless, their motherlands are worthless, as if we are all defined in financial terms.
The crescendo of the day is complete. The joyous ruckus of children whipped into a frenzy over the satisfaction of wholly met desires. It’s what I always wanted!! Thank you!! You’re the best mom, ever! Oh yes. I am. For now. And that’s OK. I felt the same way about my own mother. Absolutely head over heals indebted and in love one minute, then plotting my escape for all eternity the next. It’s the way it works. Family. Love them. Hate them. Never really escape them.
