We wake up and sing in the shower, pull on jeans, kiss peripherally, orchestrate the tussle underway on our big bed: two boys in various states of undress, pulling off jammies, pulling on t-shirts, underwear, socks. We wake up reluctant, unnerved, motivated, undone, and move towards the day with whatever we have. There is automaticity to it, inevitability, determination.
We wake up and laugh, or awaken and bury our heads. We wake up grinning, or we wake up feeling like shit. We wake up. This is a thing that we do together, daily. It is a thing we give each other, an act, an offering, a small choreography of solidarity between us—like the tremolo of a dancer’s fingers; or the way a leaf, caught in the lattice, always flutters with the wind.
We wake up, stretch, curl away or towards each other. Sometimes we are like otters; sometimes we awaken ahead of the children and burrow into each other’s warmth and linger; sometimes we wake late with eyelids still snugged tight with sleepy sand and then the green digital numbers on the bedside clock become unforgiving marshals of lateness. Whatever way, we get up.
We dress the children and make coffee. Pour cereal. Scramble eggs. Toast. We circumscribe each other with sideways glances, both of us wondering what the day will hold. We hold hands. We hold the hands of our boys. We hold hats and jackets and empty half-gallon milk jars to be returned to the farm. We hold half-eaten raspberry jam toast, more coffee in a to-go mug, wallets, keys. The day starts in again. We hold our breath.
We hold each other.
