I ran the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon. I ran it with my newly adult son, 18. I ran it because prom night was the night before and he didn't attend, didn't take a girl, didn't take a boy. I live in So Cal, but my town grows red, grows conservative children, and my son isn't entirely welcome. He skipped prom, chose to stay home, and when I understood this, I paid one hundred twenty dollars each for our privilege of pain. Might as well use our feet, our legs, while your friends are sleeping off hangovers, I said. He didn't agree. He didn't disagree. We ran.
I pinned my number to my shirt at 3:30 am. My son pinned his one minute before race start. I drank two cups of yellow gatorade, downed three cups of water and one half a sesame bagel one hour before race start. My son bummed a sip of my water. I stretched hamstrings, quads, calves. I meditated. I centered my thoughts, my mind, spread my spiritual essence upon the blacktop before the race. My son stared into space, didn't acknowledge my nutrition, my plan, my being. We ran.
One mile, two miles, three. We ran. We didn't speak. I was nervous. I never ran this far in my life. My son was frustrated. He didn't say No before the race. He didn't think to drop out, to tell me No, to tell me Forget It Man, to leave me with my PowerBars and extra safety pins at the gate. He stood next to me. We ran.
He turned 18 that morning. I remember his birth. I remember I wasn't much older than he is now. I remember my African American midwife with the tie-dye smock, the way my water broke at K-Mart and my husband wouldn't take me to my birthing room until he bought his stuff. I remember my son's first best friend and his loneliness. I remember the way he hated school and the way he loved me. I remember his favorite foods and his first word. I don't think he thought about these things Sunday morning. I don't think he thought anything but My Mom Is A Fricken Nut. I could read his mind. I could pull that thought into my field of view, hold it in front of those fifteen thousand runners like an airplane banner. Nut. Freak. But I Love Her. That was there too. We ran.
We called people on my cell phone. Actually I called them, made them say Happy Birthday to my son. He held the phone, looked frustrated, tired, but he talked, made jokes, made small talk, just ran. We ran.
And at mile 18 I wondered what the hell I was doing. I wondered exactly what the hell I was doing. It's mile 18, I said! I said it bright, blonde hardwood bright, smiled, grabbed his arm to slow us to a walk, pointed at the mile marker, the time bar, held my palm out for a high five, said it again: Hey! It's Mile 18! And you are 18 today! This is your mile! He rolled his eyes, didn't answer me, didn't do anything but walk. We walked.
Somewhere around mile 22 I hit my wall. I realized I pulled my son into some ritual he didn't understand. This was my role playing game, my recreation of childbirth, my personal sweat lodge moment, and I confused it with celebration, with a rite of passage he wasn't ready to make. But then it was too late. We ran. We walked. We didn't talk.
And then we passed the marker for Mile 24. Two miles to go, two miles to cross the line, get off this crazy train, tend our blisters and our sanity. But something funny happened. We ran, our feet slapping ground between strides, a shuffle dance, slow and deliberate and pathetic. And a woman passed us, a women gray as granite, short, stooped, heavy, sixty-five if she was a day, and she scooted a white cane in front of her, the thin echo cane of the blind, and she wore a T-shirt emblazoned with Caution! Blind Runner! And we laughed. Hell, we laughed. We hugged each other and laughed at our turtle pace, at the old fat blind woman passing us, at all the old weird incapacitated people passing us left and right, and we stopped, grabbed our stomachs, somehow reconnected as mother-son unit. Somehow found enough tempo to beat our final notes, to cross the line holding hands, to grab our medals and pose.
Three days later I hear my son talk to his friends on the phone. Yeah, I ran a marathon this weekend, he says. Yeah. I ran with my mom.
Crystal tagged me with a music meme a while back. Catnmus tagged me with a book meme this past week. Mike tagged me with a childhood meme last night. I'm breaking the rules and mixing the memes, making my own list of disconnected music and childhood and book thoughts. Evolve or die!
Three Moments I Figured Out Something Important:
Whip it, whip it good
Tenth grade. School dance. I wore tight Jordache jeans and feathered my hair, leaned with my best friend against the gym wall, watched boys lurch and stumble, waited, waited, waited for those boys to coax us under the disco ball. A DJ played pop rock, the bubblegum songs the teachers liked, refused my requests for The Clash and The Sex Pistols.
My friend got asked first. She always did. She stood inches higher than her partner, her arms around his neck, his arms around her waist, and they shuffled to Olivia Newton-John. I saw her long blonde hair flip across his face, the way he tried to kiss her mouth but hit her pointed chin. I wanted to throw my arms around a boy, but the one I loved danced with a cheerleader. I knew he loved me, too, because we talked for hours every night on the phone - talked about science and punk rock and running away dreams. We hung out between classes at school, snuck cigarettes behind the band room. He looked at me as Elton John sang about Jeannie, looked at me and smiled, his arms hugging Popular Girl, one hand creeping under her polo shirt.
That's when I figured out that boys might love your mind, the wacky adventures you cook up behind the bleachers, but maybe that's not enough.
The Night The Dog Ate My Homework
My favorite book of all time is To Kill a Mockingbird. I read it in 9th grade, had to read it for English. I never finished an entire book before this one. I read it over and over, four times over, memorized entire paragraphs. I didn't know books told stories, thought they only smashed hard parables over your head. I wrote the best book report in the universe, drew pictures of the characters, wrote my own original play about Scout's adventures in my hometown, even typed it on my Gramma's Underwood typewriter. The morning it was due I found it in a million chewed pieces strewn across the kitchen floor. My dog ate it. I told my teacher, could barely get the words past the lump in my throat. He didn't believe me. He gave me an "F." I had detention for an entire month.
That's when I figured out that adults were cynical and tired, that they didn't stop to hear the expression of your eyes.
Symphony of Sorrowful Songs
After I was raped, I wanted to die. I can't say it more simply than that. I wanted to die. I was too tired to die. I attended therapy sessions. I slept. I don't remember most of those days, just the feeling of death, the knowing I lost one of my souls. I took a walk one of those days, my first walk outside since the rape, did it as an act of courage, walked past the place it happened. I didn't tell anyone. A bluejay followed me, flitted elm to oak, cackled Beware! Beware. Almost at the exact spot I was attacked, a dirty black cassette tape lay on the ground. Górecki. Third Symphony. I took it home. I wiped it clean with a dish towel. I played it. A woman sang sorrowful songs, sang a prayer inscribed on wall 3 of cell no. 3 in the basement of "Palace," the Gestapo's headquarters in Zadopane; beneath is the signature of Helena Wanda Blazusiakówna, and the words "18 years old, imprisoned since 26 September 1944."
No, Mother, do not weep,
Most chaste Queen of Heaven
Support me always.
I listened to that tape over and over, more times than any other piece of music in my life. It's twenty years later now, and I still listen to it once a day, sometimes more. It connected me to the chain of broken humanity, gave me another victim's hand to hold, told me to look beyond my own suffering, that beauty infiltrates everything. Everything.
That's when I figured out that boys and teachers and adults and cheerleaders and me, me too, we better hold hands this lifetime. We don't have a choice. We must paint beauty on all the walls we can.
And I'm passing my evolved "Three Moments" meme to.... everyone!
