He walked through the door after a long day of working when she presented me to him. I was half-dangling from her arm thus prompting my father to quickly drop his bags.
"Take her. I have slept only a few hours during the night and she did not let me nap today," my exhausted mother remarked as my father removed his overcoat and reluctantly took me in his arms. She had dark circles around her eyes, and as she slumped back into the kitchen to make rotis, he noticed her holding her back.
Although they never verbalized it, I assumed I was the baby from hell. Awake all night and barely sleeping during the day. The doctor told them I had colic but they were sure I was possessed. What baby hardly slept in the first three months of life?
My father took me to the sparsely furnished living room over to the rocking chair that creaked. Back and forth we swayed with the hope that the motion would soothe me and intoxicate me enough to slumber. But I clawed at his shoulder and rubbed my nose onto his cheek. I was irritated and his five o'clock shadow irritated me more.
"Has she been like this all day," he shouted to my mother in the kitchen. She was tired, aggravated and nodded slightly in response. He put me in his lap and looked at me with a glare. "You will sleep the whole night. I have to work and put food on the table. We all need our sleep, you know." I glared back and stuck my fist in my mouth to chew on my imaginary food. No use, Father. I am a nocturnal creature who will unfold my wings and haunt you by spreading my colic everywhere. Your few short hours with me will resonate with you into the night; so much so that you will never forget the day I entered into this world...
My father told me that while my mother desparately needed to sleep, he could not watch me at night. He had to work the next day therefore since she was home with me, she would and should find the time to sleep when I was put down. In essence, a logical piece of advice but the trouble was, I did not allow her that luxury. The minute I was asleep and put down in the crib, I would wake up five minutes later, screaming like a banshee. According to my father, this went on all night and all day to the point where my mother's dark circles would precipitate a call to the pediatrician's office from my father on a daily basis.
Diaper clean? Check. Finished 4 ounces of milk? Check. No inexplicable rashes on the body? Check. Burped after feeding? Check. Gaining weight? Check. Alert and aware? Check, but a little too much...No, that seems normal--alertness is good. No need to bring her in. NO NEED TO BRING HER IN....She is fine. Not much known on the topic but colic seems to be one of those diseases that has no rhyme or reason. Bear with us, sir. She will grow out of it....No sir, you cannot return her...
For many years, since early childhood, I had a re-occuring dream. Well at least I thought it was a dream but soon found out it was a distant memory that my mother could not believe. I was sitting in her lap, with her hand in my hands. I was facing away from her but nevertheless, I remembered the soothing feeling of holding her.
My mother had beautiful white, large hands. Nothing about her was petite. My bone structure has been inherited from my father's side of the family. When people see my wrists, they wrap their hands around it in amazement--so small, bony and petite you are, they comment. Then I get the side-long glance and further analysis of my hands and wrists resulting in the feeling that I am extra-terrestrial.
My mother's hands were an enigma to me, however as the years went by, I realized they represented so much more. They were my protectors, my sustenance, my ultimate connection to her. While my memories of her face sometimes eludes me, her hands seem to occupy my thoughts.
I asked my mother when I was around 17 years of age if I sat on her lap as a baby and sucked her thumb. She turned to me in amazement.
"Did your father tell you this story?"
"No," I replied puzzled at her reaction. "I seem to remember sitting in your lap with the side of your thumb in my mouth."
"How do you remember this? You were only a few months old!"
I paused, trying to remember whether she had told me the story but I was pretty sure she hadn't. She put her knitting down and smiled while shaking her head.
"Your father would be sleeping in the bedroom and I would take you out to the living room and sit in the rocker with the small lamp on so not to disturb him. You would sit in my lap and somehow find my thumb and knaw on it for hours. It was the only thing that soothed you. You would not fall asleep but you were very quiet and focused and needed complete silence. Every night for four months, we went through the same routine, without your father knowing. He thought you and I were asleep in the living room. Oddly enough, you only did this with me; you never attempted to bite your father."
"Maybe you tasted better," I laughed. She continued to stare at me in disbelief. "I do not understand how you could remember so far back. I have no pictures and I never told anyone this story."
"Why?"
"Because your father wanted his firstborn to be a son. I couldn't ruin your reputation and let him know you had me up ALL NIGHT, now could I?" My heart swelled up like a balloon. I wanted to run and hug her on the spot. She smiled sweetly at me but soon her disposition changed.
She picked up her knitting without dropping her gaze. "One day soon, I will die. And when I do, protect your children the same way I protected you," she said quite non-chalantly. No one expects their 46 year old mother to make such a blanket statement.
I felt my heart skip a beat. Did I hear her right? I looked up at her but she had returned to her knitting quietly and refused to look back at me, even after I implored her to repeat herself. She did not respond. I sat for a very long time and stared at her hands while she furiously knitted one line after another. "One day soon" came too fast. There was a storm outside while I watched the pathetic fallacy unfold. My heart thundered in my chest in response to her forewarning.
Even after 17 years, while I watched her knit, her hands were still large, white and beautiful.
And they are a constant reminder to the nightly hardship she endured that got me through my infancy...
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