Chasing Butterflies...

I was a little girl alone in my little world

Who dreamed of a little home for me

I played pretend between the trees,

And fed my house guests bark and leaves,

And laughed in my pretty bed of green

I had a dream

That I could fly from the highest swing

I had a dream

Long walks in the dark through woods grown behind the park,

I asked God who I'm supposed to be

The stars smiled down on me

God answered in silent reverie.

I said a prayer and fell asleep

I had a dream

That I could fly from the highest tree

I had a dream

Now I'm old and feeling grey

I don't know what's left to say

About this life I'm willing to leave

I lived it full I lived it well

As many tales I lived to tell

I'm ready now

I'm ready now

I'm ready now to fly from the highest tree

I had a dream...

Sometimes when I'm just sitting and it's quiet and I'm doing nothing in particular...maybe laughing at something on TV or even looking out the window. You know - one of those rare occasions when I am alone...it's on these occasions that I suddenly find myself aware of my face.  Like the exact way that my face looks at that moment because I can feel the muscles around my mouth pulling up, or I can feel the tension in my nose...and these things I feel - they feel like my mother.

Maybe as I've become a better observer.  A better artist.  A better mother - I've become more aware of the way skin feels, the way it responds to happiness and sadness...and it sounds weird to say, but I find myself wondering if Jill will feel this one day.

Will she feel me in her own smile?  The one her daddy swears is mine.

I don't know if that makes any sense. But you know that thing...The thing about your mind's eye...That thing that captures an expression that can't be explained. 

There are expressions that my mother used to make when I was a little girl. The one that said ‘come back here', ‘now you've gone too far'... ‘I love you.'  Her face has changed over time, so maybe I don't catch them that often, maybe I'm too busy to catch them...but I know they're still there.  Because I know for certain that the feeling deep inside that makes you make those faces...that can't ever go away.

Sometimes I'm too afraid to reach up and touch my lips - afraid my mother's expression will go away.  I want to hold on to her every time my daughter does something I don't know quite how to deal with...and she's only one and half.  She's only one and a half.

God help me when Jill is 16 and the act of mimicking my mother maybe - perhaps won't cut it anymore.  When she comes home with a Roy and I know she needs a Jim...

I hope my mother's expressions permanently etch themselves across the lines of my face.

These are fleeting, crazy thoughts, but they find their way into my consciousness whenever little bits of Jill's personality start to emerge in ways that are no longer defined in terms of playpens and baby swings. When the desires of her heart reach far beyond what she's been taught is safe.

What would my mother do or say? How would she look - catching Jill in the act of stealing woah-woahs?   Or when she won't give up on something...When she has a tantrum over not getting to pet any old dog on the street. When she's screaming bloody murder and passerbys think you must be abusing this poor little child.  What about that quivering lip...and the expression that says unequivocally that I'm the meanest mommy in the world.

Sometimes (when she's not behaving like the little dictator she can sometimes be) her face looks like mine.  I didn't see it at first.  I think I tried not to - for whatever reason. Preferring to see Jim in every pull of her mouth and mischievous grin, but I'm starting to see me...in the wonder.  In the disastrous enchantment with the foreign world around her.

Jim and I have an expression - we call it "Chasing Butterflies"...we use this in a lot of different ways.  It first emerged one lazy, Sunday afternoon spent in the park on a blanket.  This was quickly becoming our favorite family weekend activity and it was starting to become Jill's as well.  Ever since she'd learned how to walk (seems like she's gone straight to jogging) she's loved to explore. One day she decided that the butterfly dancing around her head needed to be pursued.  So pursue it she did...walking, falling...walking....jogging...falling...

If I hadn't known better I would have sworn the butterfly was doing it on purpose, waiting on a flower petal for just the shortest of moments before fluttering off again on a breeze...We watched for a bit...it was a safe park...we weren't too worried, until that crazy-panic filled - hand tingling- heart stopping - moment ...when she was gone. 

I'd never seen Jim move so fast.

But there she was just behind a tree...Just chasing butterflies.  It was the first time I'd ever heard Jim raise his voice even a little bit with our daughter.  Fear makes you do things.  Your instincts go crazy. One minute your voice emerges in a tone you're not familiar with and the next minute renders you silent.  You can't talk much when you're busy smothering your child with affection

From that day forward, Jim's journal entries became more and more like brief little PSA's:

Dear Jill,

Stop that.

Imploringly,

Daddy

P.S.   THAT is tough love

The picture I'd drawn next to this entry was one of Jim - looking perplexed and swatting at a butterfly.

The problem with Jill is that she has this crazy sense of security.  Absolutely no fear. Even her aversions to monkeys and harmonicas have taken a dive in the past month or two.  She's growing up.  Growing into her own personality and taking chances all her own. 

But she just...flits!  She just flits around! And those are the times I remember my mother saying, "Pamela, I don't know what to tell you...if you don't look where you're going...blah, blah, blah....," I'm sure I was too busy flitting to remember what dire fate would befall me if I kept my current bout of inattention going.

So the fact is...we have a mischievous, wandering...happy child on our hands...and I guess we had it coming.  Describing her this way makes her sound like some kind of sprite...and I'm not sure it's entirely inaccurate.   Jim swears that when she asks where babies come from, he's going to tell her that we found her in the woods. 

Maybe my worrying is for nothing. I suppose until the day she stops glancing my way to find out if food is too hot, stops following the sound of my voice, until she stops making eye contact just before being passing into someone else's arms...or the day she stops placing her sweet little palm against my cheek when she's getting sleepy...

I suppose until then I'll just look at her with my mother's eyes and use expressions that aren't my own...Holding her hand while we're in the park - and letting go every once in awhile.  Because sometimes chasing butterflies works out just fine.

Lyrics from Dream, by Priscilla Ahn