The Darkest Hour
It was 6 AM. I’m up regularly before this time. Sometimes at 4:45, 5, with no problem but today it’s a struggle. The little one is grunting, whining, and doing that cough cry that I know will eventually work itself into a wail that my 3 year-old won’ t be able to sleep through.
And my 3 year-old is up. Asking for breakfast. I tell her it’s too early and make a bargain. Warm milk for more sleep. She promises me nothing as she takes the milk from my husband.
The baby is still complaining so I abandon sleep, find my glasses, wrap her against my body and prepare to start the day. I like getting an early start. I’m my mother’s child and remember her always being up before dawn cleaning, cooking, praying. I still know I can call my parent’s house before 6 AM. They’ll both be up just having completed their 5 AM prayers.
Growing up I remember warning my sleepover mates, “Oh by the way, my parents, especially my dad, starts praying at around 4:45 in the morning. It’s not quiet white people prayer either, it’s loud Nigerian singing prayer so…don’t freak out.”
The baby is wrapped, I’m up bouncing her to no music. I put on a CD. Peter Kater’s soundtrack from “10 Questions for the Dalai Lama.” Never saw the film but the passion he puts into his music reminds bleed all over everything I do. There’s nothing to save ourselves for, no reason to be stingy with our spirits. Maybe that’s another reason we have monthly periods. To remind us that life was meant to flow outside of our individual bodies.
She’s still fussing. Even wrapped. I take her to the living room window. It’s as dark as midnight before the sun breaks into day. It feels like the middle of the night. Streetlamps tell me it rained. Early risers head to work. I can see their brake lights. A woman walks her dog.
I perch my computer on a shelf and get ready to cram as much work in as I can. I love getting an early start. It’s a game I play. How much work can I get done before the sun arrives. I race the big ball of burning gas and challenge her. I always win.
She’s still complaining. Now she’s stretching her body against the wrap as if trying to escape. Where are you going, child? Crying.
I go between bouncing around the room and attempting to type. She won’t let me.
Resentment bubbles up…I breathe. I abandon my computer and head into the back guestroom. I take her out of the wrap and ask her if she wants to nurse. She does. A little. She snacks. Not really hungry. I look at her face and ask her what she’s trying to teach me. I really want to work right now.
I relax my mind and lose my expectations. I think of myself as everything and nothing. Six weeks ago she was born and I remember the moment in labor, it must be a universal experience, where I faded so much into the moment that I didn’t care whether I lived or died. It’s not because of any pain or fatigue, life or death just lost all meaning and all that mattered was completion; the manifestation of the present moment. That experience must be what everyone who meditates is trying to break through to. I remember it clearly with both labors but more with the second because I was alone. Nothing mattered except completion; there was no attachment to any particular outcome.
She calmed down. Her eyes are black, just like her sister’s. So deep and black. The baby looked at me and said, “If you can’t be anything more than a to do list, I’m sad. That is a tragedy.”
OK. I understand.
I put her back in the wrap. As I placed her legs between the folds of brown fabric she burped and smiled at me. Silly girl.
I didn’t see the sun rise but as the sky went blue I knew morning had come. And she slept.
Wow! This is so beautiful! Your daughter sounds like a wonderful teacher.
She absolutely is. Thank you.