Category: Changes Within

All That I’ve Met

Posted on by Sierra

A few days ago, I brought Maeby inside from a morning piddle and found my grandma with her arm around my father singing, “My home’s in Montana, I wear a bandana, my spurs are silver, my pony is grey! When riding the ranges, my luck never changes, oh yippee ki, yippee ki, yippee ki-yay!”

She’s commissioned the entire family to learn it while she stays with us this winter. Recently, we were all indulgently singing along, and my father pulled up a quiet Youtube video of ambulance sirens which could only be heard by Maeby. The sirens prompted Maeby to howl along while the rest of us were Yippee Ki-Yaying. We all giggled happily afterwards, but there was a subtle profundity to the experience too.

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Posted on by Sierra

I woke up this morning in, what I realized too late, is my very favorite place in the entire world. I’m actually still here. I have to soak it up, because I’m here for the last time.

I’m in the middle of my bed, snuggled in between my husband, who’s arm is tucked under mine like a teddy bear, and Maeby, who has been grunting lately when she doesn’t get her way. She just let out an expressive groan when I dove (gently) under her belly to find my cell phone so I could capture this moment with words. Technically, there’s a baby in the middle with me too. He’s doing little flips in my tummy as we speak. 

Hard Things Can Also Be Good

Posted on by Sierra

Tonight on my way home from tutoring, I saw a hardened old, grocery store clerk snarl at another employee while arranging a strange winter display of watermelon outside the storefront. And just when my mind was made up about said curmudgeonly store clerk, I watched him secretly slip an ice cube from his watermelon display to an aging golden retriever passing by on the street. It was a quick reversal of thoughts–from resenting this old man for yelling publicly at a coworker, to loving him for sharing an ice cube.   Of course as frequently happens when a pregnant person experiences two emotions too close together, this little gesture made me tear up at the crosswalk between 92nd and 93rd street. 

Why I am Never Having Kids (A Pity Party)

Posted on by Sierra

I’m not making some bold, feminist stance or anything.

It’s because of my broken uterus. Or fallopian tubes. Or ovaries. Or something. We don’t actually know, but something is misfiring and it’s not Jeremy.  How boring. We’re never having kids, not as an active choice but just because kids won’t come. Maybe they’re afraid of what kind of mother I’ll be. I worry about that sometimes too. I take things real personal sometimes. 

It’s December 3rd.

Posted on by Sierra

If it hasn’t snowed (which, it hasn’t snowed), then December 3rd has a specific sort of smell. I think it’s the smell of frozen grass and crinkly leaves commingling. For some reason, I get the distinct whiff of cobblestones on December 3rd, and just so there can be a symphony of senses, there’s the sound of a shimmer of resilient leaves in the trees, and my chin starts to numb because it’s just barely too early for scarves. 

I like the way December 3rd is.

One

Posted on by Sierra

I do not have time to write this blog post. Which means I’m writing it on the D line, and it’s rush hour, so I’m writing on my cell phone with just my right thumb while I cling onto the rail with my left. One never does her best writing on the subway. One-thumbed writing is hasty, filled with run on sentences and typos that people privately message me about after my blog is posted. 

I Wish I Hadn’t Said Nothing

Posted on by Sierra

I wish I hadn’t said nothing.
Hands folded around a dollar bill like a newborn clutching her mother’s fingers.
An interchange in my pocket.
She, big and blue, asked me for spare change with a darlin’ attached to the question.
I am the giver of granola bars, the tucker of money underneath shopping cart wheels.
I am not the bolded question mark that asks what you’ll do with my money.
It’s yours now.
But it’s stuck in my pocket.
Because I said nothing.