Most days are seamless as water. Weeks, months– these things flow into one another like so many overlapping bays. We have no river mouth, no branching tributary to mark our place. We drift on the current unaware, and then suddenly find ourselves looking for landmarks in a place devoid of any landscape at all: “Did we go to their house before our vacation, or after?” “Was that meeting two weeks ago now, or was it three?” “When, exactly, was that?”
Points of reference in time, when we haven’t got it all down on a calendar or, even, haven’t our calendars before us are, really, very difficult to find.
But there are Some Times that break the water’s surface and sit, for a time, immoveably present: an island of event and memory on which we look back and remember.
Last week we were on Spring Break. And last week, my parents were here.
Last Friday through Sunday, my mother and I were on Emerald Isle for my church women’s retreat.
Last week, Every Morning, my father and I went for a very long and very fast walk and talked about innumerable things.
One week ago today we did a Tremendous Amount of yard work together– the children, my parents, and I– and exposed, with clippers and rake and the power of our five pairs of arms– a long-unseen garden at the side of our house.
Last Wednesday we went to Chapel Hill and visited the Ackland Art Museum, a place none of us had ever seen, with the exception of Everett, who had been there on a field trip and was pleased to show us the highlights.
Last week, we watched Every Single Episode of season two of The Office, and Bill, my parents and I Split Our Sides with laughing. We watched some of the episodes Twice.
Last week I did much less laundry than usual, and this was not because we had less laundry to do, but because my mother kept doing it faster than I could keep up.
Last week, my mother cleaned up the kitchen Most Of The Time.
Last week my parents and I, from time to time, spoke with love and longing of my grandparents.
Last weekend, with the help and encouragement of my parents and Bill’s mother, Bill and I attacked and completed the long-overdue and long-dreaded task of refinishing the vaulted ceiling in our breakfast room. It looks Much Better Now.
Last week, my father fixed all kinds of things in want of repair in my house, including things I had Utterly Forgotten, including things I didn’t know needed to be fixed.
Last week my mother went about scrubbing dirty places on the walls of my kitchen, and spackling, and touching up paint here and there.
Last Monday, we went to Duke Gardens and to the Chapel, where we walked around and looked at and talked about the Stations of the Cross. My mother and I told the children about Jesus’s attention to women, and how His interactions with them helped to change the regard of women throughout history.
Last week my mother rebuilt the crumbling rock wall at the edge of my front garden.
Last week my parents helped me to love my house again.
Yesterday morning my parents went home.
I think maybe we didn’t actually do all the clipping in the yard on Tuesday; I think it was on Wednesday that we spent so much time outdoors in the untimely heat, and my mother brought us all glasses of lemonade. I don’t remember, exactly, what we did on Thursday, but I know that was the day we started on the kitchen ceiling. I don’t really remember what we did on Friday either, but I know that I tried not to dread Monday, and I think I graded some papers.
Still, there it is, just over my shoulder, so newly behind me: my parents’ long-awaited visit. An island of time, its green still fresh and the waves still crashing audibly along its shoreline.
How will I remember it? “Remember, Mom, when you and Dad came that time? Remember? And you stayed for more than a week? And we had such a good time together, and you helped us get all that stuff done… Remember?”
“When was that?”
March 9-19, 2007.
Thanks so much, Momma and Dad, for coming.
