My Daughter, the Foodie
Bink loves food. In fact, her relationship with it goes far beyond what tastes good and satisfies her hunger. She loves looking at cookbooks, finding recipes on the computer, and watching cooking shows. The painting subject she selects for her weekly art class is often something edible. The paintings on our walls at home, and […]
WALKING
At twelve, thirteen, fourteen months, when most children begin to walk, or make a show of pulling their soft wobbly bodies to stand, you were content to sit and rub the carpet, watch the fibers grow fuzz beneath hands you didn’t seem to know belonged to you. A plump child you were, with flesh-ringed legs […]
Kind or Write?
I’ve been finding it challenging to encapsulate life with my daughter, Bink, lately. Hard to shape words for the page and even for casual conversation with friends, many of whom have their own experiences with parenting and/or caring for people they love who have special needs. It’s not for lack of material. Bink continues to […]
Dear Future Roadmaker
It’s still April, still Autism Awareness month. I’m thinking, as I so often do, of all the people I have met on my journey of raising a daughter with special needs. There have been some wonderful teachers and some exceptional therapists (physical, occupational, speech and language, to name a few). There have been good hearted […]
Our small eyes
Perchance Perhaps nothing begins or ends, not exactly. The field mouse knows the tall grass to be her world. We say morning comes, and yet it is always somewhere, just not in the very front of our small eyes. The trees are wise. They know everything cycles, seed to sapling, strong trunk reaches skyward,, and […]
To Sleep, Perchance to Wake and See the Stars
Bink does not sleep solidly through the night, ever. When she was younger it was especially challenging, because she’d wake up and need me to be right there with her, and she’d often be up for hours. Sometimes, after waking at 1 or 2 am, she’d stay up the rest of the night and all […]
Love is a Rendering
Love is a Rendering Telling you how I love you is like trying to find things that haven’t been said about the ocean. My hands prefer to paint it— affection, water— sweeping, striped backgrounds, turquoise and deep salient greens, silvery whites frosting every liquid peak, and there’s the sky hovering above the seas like […]
Daisy Bell
I’m showing my age, and proudly, when I ask this—do you remember the sweet old song called Daisy Bell? “Daisy, Daisy, tell me your answer, do/ I’m half crazy all for the love of you…” Those lyrics and that tune lodged itself in my memory when I was nine or ten years old. I can clearly visualize […]
Arrivals
I’m posting this a day before my daughter’s 26th birthday. I’ve always felt, with certainty, that we were meant to incarnate this way, as mother and daughter, at this particular time in the life of this planet. I don’t need to know why, because I know it’s true. Happy birthday, Bink. You are the best […]
The Meaning of Compassion
The Kuan Yin She keeps watch in the warm corner of my bedroom, her bearing almost more regal for the rivers of cracks and generous chips that mark her faded turquoise. Her right hand, the deliverer of action, folds into Gyan Mudra, the gesture of consciousness. Preparing to take her picture, I haul myself into […]