Perspective

I am, perhaps, 3 or 4. I recall watching my Mom teach tap in our living room. The view is slightly askew, as I am peering through the octagon openings of my playpen. I remember the sound of tapping on upside down paneling and my Mom in black pants and a colored top.

I am 7. I sit, suntanned legs dangling over the rock ledge. I watch ants meander over moss as I read book after book. I scan the Croghan horizon and wonder at the lonely vehicle or two that happens by. Leaves curl on the ground below me and I pull my hand-knit-sweater-with-the-white-bunnies-on-it a bit tighter around my tiny shoulders. I hear my Mom calling to me from our patio, but keep reading. I know that she knows where I am, and we both know I won't be coming in the kitchen door until this book is finished.

I am 10. We are moving. Only one town over, but it feels so far away. I will go to the same school, and I will keep the same friends (perhaps). I stay up all night, looking out my bedroom window, and memorizing every moonstruck shrub and tree branch. Even now, I can summon that scene and feel the heat of my breath as I strain to commit every detail to memory. In the morning, I stumble among boxes and pretend I am not sleepy. I occupy my brother as my Mom reads from lists and tells Dad and family and friends what Not To Drop Or Else.

I am just 18. I will go to college tomorrow. I tip toe into my brother's room and watch his silhouette rise and fall with his breathing. There are 9 and a half years between us, yet we are very close. I have been a huge part of his first 8 years. I am saddest about leaving him. I creep silently up my attic-room stairs, knowing which step to avoid to make sure the CREEEEAAAKing sound won't wake anyone. I cuddle on the window seat and look out the window. Again, I commit to memory small details. The arch of the Beaver River bridge in the distance- steel meeting sky in a silver arc against the pale gray of morning. I peer down into our side-yard above-ground pool and stare at the neighbor's kitchen entrance. I love our neighbor, Mrs. Cowles. She was the elementary librarian at my school and had introduced me to so many wonderful authors. I close my eyes and watch the sparks of my overtired brain grow and subside. In the morning, we drive to Hartwick. My Mom sits, silent and sad.

I am a college graduate. Jeanine and I stand on the back (unsafe, I am sure) balcony of our Gault Street Ghetto Apartment and toast to our future. We have been up all night, savoring our academic victory, and clinging to our last gasp of life-before-we-have-to-grow-up. I see my favorite friend. She is slim and pretty. Short brown hair frames her brown eyes. I know she hears my words, I know she understands me. I am suddenly afraid. Afraid of making adult friends who will never know me like she does. I find myself doing it again- looking at every detail around us... the cement, the pavement below, the one dangling safety light that my Dad insisted on installing. I can still hear mumbled conversation from the SUCO guys living below and see the bubbles dissipating in my tiny, plastic champagne flute. The phone rings. Jeanine goes inside to answer it. She calls out to me- "It's for you. It's your Mom".

I am a Mom.  I am a MOM. The nurse comes in (again) and tells me to get some sleep. She is, obviously, delusional. Can she not see this baby? This tiny extension of me? This person who I made? Sleep is not welcome. I have a job to do. I must memorize her hair (dark brown ringlets), her eyes (gray blue orbs), her hands (pink-five-fingered-wonders). I pet her and coo at her and we stare at each other. Look at that! She is memorizing me, too! It is now 20 years that I have been a Mom. I have done this for every moment of her life- memorized her. It is what Moms do, I suppose.

I have driven her to Hartwick. I have been sadly silent. I have unloaded the boxes and bins and watched her eyes light up at the "possibilities". I have seen this and I have embraced it, and I have thought of my Mom.

More than any two people, I have memorized them- My Mom and My Daughter. One gone and one going on. One who I struggle every day to "see". One who I sometimes long to see. One whose voice I can hear in my head- and one who I hope- hears mine.

I cannot tell you what has formed your perspective on this journey called Life. You cannot tell me what has formed mine. What we see now is formed by a string of visions we have already seen. These Polaroids are mapped in our brains and we call upon them when we need them.

I sit and stare out my window. Tree branches hang bare and naked over thawing snow. A squirrel quips something taunting my way, and the neighbor's dog barks at a non-descriptive object in their yard. This is where today's perspective begins. It is solely mine. This is my perspective.