Here, we have little and it feels light. Our small apartment floods at daybreak with the tropical brightness that has always felt buoyant to me and clean. Its white tile floors and white-washed walls echo the light, the simplicity, the cleanliness (although, given the aggressiveness of the mold in this part of the world, that cleanliness will be fleeting unless I get my act in gear). It has two beds and a couch. A few dishes. A table and chairs. We brought faded, nearly outgrown summer clothes and a few towels, a laptop, toiletries. There is little to care for or care about. Life is reduced to its essence, time with our children, time to write, time to think, time to be together. Time. Unfettered, uncommitted time. It's a luxury as dear as the bright tropical sun and pure white sand beaches.
Even with all of that time, or maybe because of it, I have struggled to begin this post. I've been reluctant to open my email, my comments, my reader because I will immediately feel the pressure to post, to respond, to read and comment. Things I love to do, but they take time. Because I fear something from home will intrude, questions about the fundraiser I planned before I left, problems with our house, reminders of responsibilities and commitments that will shatter the illusion that our life is simple, that time is plentiful and that it is mine.
I could go on hiding, post quickly that the beach is heaven and the kids are fine and life is golden and grand. That's not really what I want. I miss you. I enjoy you. I want to write and connect and reimmerse myself, bug you all with my stories and read yours in return. This is the best technology has to offer, connection with people, sharing of stories, finding common bonds. This is worth my time.
Where to begin? At the beginning? With me, standing, incredulous, mouth open before a Northwest representative in the chilly, unreal fluorescence of our small town airport at 5:30 a.m. as she informed me deadpan and uncaring that my nine large, heavy pieces of luggage and I were in the wrong terminal for check in.
In the middle? Half way across the Pacific, claustrophobic and clammy-hot, tired beyond endurance of my three small children, their whining, their short attention spans, their unending wallowing. Breathing, just breathing to keep from exploding with the need for no one to be touching me, for them to leave my space, the uncomfortably small, constricted space assigned to me for those ten miserable hours. To please just sit in their own seats, quiet and still so that I could read a book, watch a movie, take a nap. Anything to make a small portion of the avalanche of minutes we must sit in those seats pass by a little faster. Anything to glance at the trip clock and find that an hour had actually passed, not three excruciating minutes.
Should I tell you about how I let Ess fall asleep without putting a diaper on her not once, but twice, and soak herself and two different airplane seats with urine. Yes, we are that family. We are the family that pees in airplane seats, the reason that 20/20 and Sixty Minutes can do special reports about the foulness of public seating.
Should I tell you about changing Gee and Que in the airless torture chambers also known as airplane restrooms. Maybe I should write about the family bathroom and changing facility in the Narita airport that was so spacious and sterile and high tech, it brought tears of thankfulness to my eyes. How I wanted to get down on my knees and worship at its child friendly bathroom holiness. How you have to touch nothing. You don't even have to wipe. It has a button that initiates rinsing. I know. I cried a little.
All of that might bore you. Near the end might be better? Picture Matt and I enduring the four hour lay over in Japan with clenched teeth and gritty eyes. Our patience spent, our children hyperactive with over tiredness, loud and brash and naughty, knocking things over and climbing on chairs and bothering people as we struggled to control them through an exhausted fog. The final three hour flight to Saipan, where blissfully, finally, they all slept (we heard angels from on high singing). We could close our eyes for a few hours and doze to the metallic hum of the plane engines propelling us back out over the dark Pacific.
At the end? As we staggered up two flights of concrete stairs to our second story apartment at 2:00 a.m. Saipan time, a little over twenty-four hours after I locked our back door for the final time, jet lagged and bleary with exhaustion, arms full of bags and discarded clothing and children. The sickening moment when Gee stumbled forward toward the railing and met nothing but air, the concrete slats too wide to stop him, and fell headfirst nine feet to the concrete stairs below. Our dizzy, disbelieving nausea when Matt reached him and he was unmarked, completely unhurt except for a small bruise on his forehead.
Should I tell you how we sat, hours later, with the children finally in bed, shaky and disoriented, and Matt said, it's like we won the lottery. I nodded. Better than if we won the lottery. Who wouldn't trade everything they had, every penny they owned to bring their child safely through a deadly momentary lapse of their judgment?
I actually think I started in exactly the right place. Just passed the end. Safe and somewhat rested. Later that morning when the balmy dawn woke our jet lagged babies. As history was made half a world away, we loaded them into our borrowed Ford Escort (I squeezed my ass, and I do mean squeezed into the entirely too narrow wedge of seat between the two car seats in the back seat), and drove down to a local doughnut shop for coffee and treats. We carried them to the closest beach, jubilant, drunk on sunshine and trade winds and the little ones' infectious excitement. We sipped our coffee (oh, glorious caffeine) and watched them while they marveled, laughing uproariously, at the soft white sand and let the bathwater warm Pacific lap their toes and threw seashells into the surf. Breathing deeply, letting the salty tropical breeze blow our doubts and our fears and the lingering uncertainty away.
That's the end. Of the trip, anyway. The beginning of our three month adventure. Three days later, I am reveling in the freedom of our uprooted existence. The lack of schedule. The fact that I don't care if they drip sand and seawater across the floor. That, in the absence of their basement full of boring toys, they are able to play for an hour with two matchbox cars and a pile of shoes.
As intoxicating as it is, I know a completely unfettered life is a life not lived. The charm lies, to some extent, in the knowledge that the commitments of home lie waiting, the strings are only stretched, not cut. But, for now, I'm going to treasure the time we have. Treat this precious, open, sun drenched time as the gift that it is.
And try not to let any one important drown.
The pool at our apartment with view.
Don't you? Wanna be him? A little? Maybe nibble him a tiny bit?
Yikes. Breathe. We don't come up this way anymore.
A local resort and water park.
If I could put time in a bottle... Don't know the reason, I stayed here all season... For five points and a chance for a package from Saipan, name those tunes. Also, huge props to Renee at Cutie Booty Cakes and Katy at Funny Girl. They tracked me down to name that tune in the last post on which I wimpily closed comments. Five points each because I loves them like tropical sunshine and for ingenuity. Tomorrow, I am coming to a blog near you, to read and comment and reimmerse. I have time.
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